I’ve heard of the “all Audi A4” car rental service Silvercar for a while and always wanted to try it out. But its price in NYC is just not that competitive compared to other companies. One-day rental from its Manhattan/Brooklyn location is usually over 200$ and excluded from most promotions. On the recent travel to Las Vegas I finally gave it a try.
Overall the service was very good. There is a mobile app so I wondered if I would just unlock my car and go like some zipcar places. But actually there is a Silvercar shop at the location. The friendly staff there helped me situated in minutes.
The car itself was quite new and sleek. Audi definitely felt more powerful than most rental cars I was used to, as a result I probably drove a bit faster than usual during the 3-day rental, lol. The car is equipped with SIRIUS XM and heated seats, which are not often available in rental cars. Also a small USB car charger is provided as a nice little convenience, instead of being sold at the counter for 15 bucks… oh and the car has built-in WIFI!
However the experiences were not flawless, or as they advertised “car rental the way it should be”, mainly because the car is lack of 2 features: USB port and rear camera! Honestly I was supsurprised that the car had WIFI and LCD screen but no USB or rear camera, which are not rare from rental companies like AVIS anymore and I think they are very useful. In fact I often pick rental cars just by whether it has USB if I have several cars to choose from.
Other than that, there really isn’t much to complain. The return was easy and fast too. The location is not within LAS airport so a staff actually drove us to the terminal with our rental car, not by bus. The gas refill was 5$ convenience fee + 2.59$ per gallon while the usual gas price in town runs at 2.3~2.4$, pretty reasonable. Oh and the rental price was 39$ per day as a promotion. So in general I was pretty happy with the rental but next time I may just rent from Avis for USB port and rear camera… Avis is usually cheaper than Silvercar anyway.
