MGI Navigator Ai GPS+ Electric Buggy — Review

Reviewing the MGI Navigator Ai GPS+ electric buggy presented some challenges.

You see, after a few uncomfortable experiences I’ve come to regard electric golf buggies as the Volvos of golf course transportation.

Yes, they’re a perfectly acceptable and reliable way of getting from A to B. But they are often controlled by people with the spatial awareness of a screen-addicted teen.

Meet Terry (not his real name), whose remote-controlled electric buggy routinely topples into bunkers, gets stuck in shrubbery and, in my very lived experience, menaces fellow golfers going about their business.

However, it’s not the buggy’s fault.

Terry gets distracted when talking up his share portfolio or outlining 17 reasons why he will never buy an electric car, forgetting that his electric buggy is hurtling up the fairway, out of sight and out of control.

In the wrong hands electric buggies can be a pest.

But I was determined my previous experiences weren’t going to skew my opinion of the new MGI Navigator Ai GPS+ electric buggy.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS

Out of the box, the MGI Navigator Ai GPS+ (surely that’s one label too many) didn’t require as much assembly as I thought it might.

It was essentially connecting the wheels (two rear drive wheels and a pair of front guide wheels) to the chassis and once they clicked in, you were done.

Unfolding the buggy wasn’t too bad either when you got the hang of it. The key was setting the top bracket first and then everything folded into place in one relatively smooth motion (my non-golfing wife thought the Ai buggy resembled an old man's walking frame when fully extended, but I should also point out she thinks old Hyundais look cool).

One of the most impressive things about the MGI Navigator Ai GPS+ (from here on in, to be referred to as the Ai) was the way the new battery was formed into the chassis, kind of like an F1’s monocoque design.

It was a great idea that was extremely well executed; seriously, what’s more appealing than simply clicking the battery into the frame?

Speaking of the frame, it looked rugged and was constructed mostly from aluminium tube, with rigid black plastic connecting points linking the whole thing together.

The tubing was finished in a metallic black paint (the Ai also comes in grey) and a teal and grey pinstripe running down the side of it was a nice visual touch.

But in one of those rare moments where it is possible to look expensive and cheap at the same time, the top box and handle did look slightly out of place.

The four-inch touchscreen was undoubtedly classy but the plastic shell surrounding it did look a little clumsy and haphazard, as if the designers had run out of ideas after investing so much effort to get the touchscreen right.

To be fair, the plastic surround was probably hiding a bird's nest of wiring and circuitry. But much like Luc Longley at the Chicago Bulls, it wasn't quite as dazzlingly brilliant as the rest of the outfit.

However, I did like the all-terrain rear wheels, which featured some cool chrome on the spokes that were a nice switch up from previous solid-coloured MGI wheels.

And kudos to MGI for adding a pair of charging ports underneath the Ai’s handle, an old-school USB-A and a slimline USB-C port.

TOP BOX SET-UP 

There’s no denying the hero of the Ai buggy is the touch screen near the handle.

It’s the brains that provides the buggy brawn, receiving the signals from the handheld remote to adjust the speed and direction.

It’s also a GPS unit, digital scorecard and provides statistical analysis of your game, among other things.

However, setting the darned thing up required navigating my way through a snag that was, admittedly, not entirely the buggy’s fault.

As mentioned previously, I like to think I have a decent clue when it comes to technology.

I know the difference between iOS and Android and generally have a passable level of technical experience, gleaned mainly from past interactions with IT help desk staff that usually ended in a request to turn the power off and on.

The thing is, setting up the MGI top box kind of snookered me for quite a while.

The Ai required a WiFi connection to register the buggy and unlock the 40,000-odd GPS-mapped golf courses.

But rather annoyingly, I kept getting an error message that my serial number was already taken and the buggy was assigned to another MGI account.

Had someone hacked my buggy, waiting for the right moment to send it into a hilarious 360° spin just as I was grabbing my driver out of the bag on the first tee?

With paranoia creeping in, I figured multiple hard resets and Bluetooth uncouplings might rectify the situation — until I finally discovered my iPhone’s automatic “Hide My Email” function was the culprit.

It was generating a conflicting email address to the one I had manually entered into the buggy’s touchscreen at set-up; as soon as I turned the iPhone’s security feature off, the buggy was good to go.

I should point out the connectivity of the Ai is one of its strong points, with a terrific new feature being MGI's over-the-air updates.

When connected to WiFi the buggy is automatically refreshed with any software patches and the bank of GPS course maps are also updated with the latest changes.

The clever Ai buggy even allows golfers to report a course map that needs updating via the touch screen.

It was an uber-focused detail that, to me, highlighted MGI's user-first approach with the Ai buggy.

HOW’D IT PERFORM?

Though it was fairly heavy (17.69kg with the battery loaded) the Ai was easy to unfold once the top bracket was retracted, and it proved just as easy to fold up.

The Ai features a nifty new system that makes it far more compact when folded up, with the quick release rear wheels able to be inverted on the axle to reduce the width of the Ai when stowed.

The footprint was noticeably more compact and it made it much more convenient when lifting the buggy into a vehicle.

Loading and securing a bag to the buggy was also extremely straightforward.

The Ai’s top and bottom brackets featured sticky rubberised grips while elastic straps and hook fasteners held the bag in situ.

Meanwhile, the redesigned remote of the Ai was slimmer, which made it easier to store in a pocket., however it did have its moments during testing.

Most of the time the buggy was as agile as a meerkat when responding to the commands sent by the remote.

However, there was the odd occasion where it took a little longer than usual — mostly when trying to stop it in its tracks.

While it didn’t happen to me, I heard a report from a reliable source that their Ai buggy did a random 360° loop in the fairway — later blamed on probable interference with another MGI remote in the vicinity.

But out on the course, the Ai was impressively quick and was probably faster than it needed to be.

What made me love it even more was it topped out at a Spinal Tap-esque 20 on the speed dial, which equates to a slow jog.

The centralised location of the battery meant the Ai was ultra-stable, which I confirmed when sending it up some particularly vertiginous terrain.

It didn’t topple backwards when heading up the slope — particularly when the buggy's fifth wheel on the undercarriage was deployed — but trying to reverse it back down resulted in some bemused looks from fellow golfers.

MGI reckon the Ai’s 24V 380Wh battery should last 36 holes per charge. In reality one round at a hilly course drained the battery to around a quarter (battery status is indicated on the screen).

While there was no drop-off in performance I'd certainly recommend charging the battery fully prior to a round.

For a non-branded unit, the Ai’s integrated GPS had a surprisingly premium look and feel about it, and I can only assume it’s made incognito by a fairly reputable brand.

The touch screen was nicely sensitive — you didn’t need to bash away at it like a woodpecker for it to respond — and the high-resolution full colour screen offered crisp detail.

A list of nearby golf courses was shown when the Ai first powered up. After selecting the course, a birds-eye view of the current hole was displayed and distances to the front, middle and rear of the green were listed in the corner of the screen.

And custom distances could be achieved simply by moving the touch screen's cursor to any point on the course map.

But undoubtedly the best part of the GPS unit was the Fly Through feature.

This little beauty offered a virtual fly through of the hole, kind of like that drone fly-through on LIV broadcasts, and was a unexpected, yet welcome, extra.

The on-board GPS also syncs with the MGI mobile app, which offers identical functionality.

THE FINAL WORD

The physical set-up of the buggy couldn't have been simpler, the folding mechanism was brilliant and despite the odd weird issue with the remote, the buggy was effortless to control on the golf course.

I did wonder whether the integrated GPS unit was just a honey trap, designed to dazzle golfers with a feature many golfers might already have access to.

But I was surprised how accurate and effective it was and I could understand the attraction of having the information right there in front of you, rather than waking-up a separate device for distance gathering.

The initial set-up of the top box and subsequent registration might stump a few people, like it did me.

And the buggy wasn't quite as quick as other GPS devices I've tested in linking to a satellite; at times I was unsure whether it was still searching for a connection or stuck in an infinite loop.

While the Navigator Ai GPS+ doesn’t have a Follow-Me function, I suspect that might be coming in the next version of the Ai.

It’s not cheap (RRP $2699.99) but I think buying an Ai will make your life better on the golf course and for the most part it’s everything you could hope for in an electric buggy.

Just don’t get distracted.

THE VERDICT

Written by Jamie Martin Jamie Martin is currently locked in a battle to keep his handicap hovering around the mid-single digits. Despite his obvious short-game shortcomings, Jamie enjoys playing and writing about every aspect of golf and is often seen making practice swings in a mirror.