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I am a ‘car guy’. You might think from all of the content on this website that I am solely interested in the goings-on of Apple, Samsung or any other tech company. And that’s partly true, but cars get me going in a different, kid-in-a-sweet shop, sort of way.
Despite this though, I had never really looked much into the world of on-board diagnostics (OBD) testing. If I’m being honest with you, I like driving and poking around inside cars, the technical stuff is left to a mechanic. But Carly, specialists in user-friendly at-home OBD testing, has totally changed how I look at my car.
I got the chance to check out the Carly OBD and accompanying app (more on that later) at the Top Gear test track recently, here’s what you need to know.
Did I just say the Top Gear test track?
Yes, you read that right. I got to go to the Top Gear test track. Not only that, but I also got driven around it by The Stig in a beefed-up BMW M3. When I say driven I actually mean raced, Ben Collins (that’s the guy who was underneath The Stig’s helmet on the show) responded to my request to ‘send it’ with gusto. I can confirm that we took Gambon at an appropriately bonkers speed.
I appreciate that this may all be going over the heads of some Americans reading this, but it was a genuine bucket-list moment ticked off the list and an all-round cracking day out. So thanks to Carly for making that happen!
Speaking for Carly, let’s get back on track.
What is the Carly OBD and how does it work?
OBD stands for on-board diagnostics. An OBD scanner is a device that plugs directly into your car to give you valuable information about your car’s health related to things like warning lights, airbags, ABS and more. The actual device plugs into your car somewhere near the steering wheel column under the dashboard, but it varies with the make of the car.
The Carly OBD scanner shows all the information when you plug it in via the corresponding Carly app which is brilliant and compatible with iOS and Android. With the car running, you can see a variety of live data, such as ignition timing, engine speed and temperature. You can also run diagnostics directly from the app.
New for this year, the Carly app is the first free online tool in the world to offer estimated prices for a repair before visiting a workshop. The OBD2 scanner is compatible with 80+ car brands with OBD2 ports which is those released after 2001. There’s also a handy function to turn the check engine light off and much more that I haven’t been able to explore yet.
Why would you use an OBD?
Apart from my whip around the track, learning about why the Carly OBD is so useful was incredibly interesting.
For a start, about 20% of car owners overpay for their repairs in part due to catching problems too late. If you notice something is starting to go wrong earlier, it’s a much easier and cheaper fix.
Remember that repair cost estimator? Well, Carly has brought that in to solve a problem they’ve identified in car ownership. They spoke on the day about how 77% of women don’t trust garages to be fully honest with them about a repair cost and 55% feel like they need a man with them to be taken seriously. That’s pretty sad to learn, but it presents an excellent reason for Carly to exist.
Knowledge is power they say and the more you know definitely helps in the world of car maintenance. I’m sure we’ve all felt like we overpaid at some point for car repairs so I see this feature being particularly useful.
Lastly, and I think most ingenious of the lot, Carly can remove a lot of the worry about buying a used car. There are estimated to be 7.6 million used car sales in the UK in 2025. Odometer fraud (that’s the thing that measures your car’s mileage) sits at 7.1% for the UK. That means up to half a million buyers are at risk of buying a car with incorrect mileage which obviously has knock-on effects for the assumptions you can make about things like engine wear.
Carly has the Used Car Inspection tool that assesses whether the odometer number corresponds to the actual state of the car by reading hundreds of data points. Along with that, you get all the regular checks to airbags and all built-in electronic control units.
Conclusion
It was amazing to drive around the Top Gear track but I also genuinely enjoyed hearing about how Carly can help car owners out. I was really impressed with the ease with which the Carly OBD gives people a higher level of understanding about their car, and the used car feature has appeal for millions.
Have you used an at-home OBD before? Let me know what it was like below!
