Recommendation: No

Quality 

Pleasantly surprised: A Must Buy

The vLinker FS Bluetooth is a wireless scan tool that can connect to iPhone, Android, and it can even connect to Windows PCs. I was interested in this scan tool because Forscan and other some other apps had it listed as being compatible. If you’re unaware, Forscan allows you to scan, run self tests, and change features on Ford, Lincoln, Mazda, and Mercury vehicles. The vLinker FS Bluetooth has a substantially lower price than the OBDLink MX+ and appeared to have the same support that the MX+ has. This had me sold, the scan tool comes in at less than half the price and yet doesn’t skimp on features, that’s an absolute win for anyone in the market for a scan tool and with it having official Forscan support it makes it an obvious choice. I also liked that they cared enough to offer firmware updates, some previous scan tools I’ve owned didn’t offer this feature and being able to update would be mostly pointless if a company didn’t bother making firmware updates that often but when looking at vGate’s website it seems like they offer firmware updates pretty regularly. That made me have even more faith in the product. At the time that I’m writing this, the last firmware update was released a few weeks ago. The shipping only took around 3-4 days and the packaging was pretty nice, I appreciate that they had a solid, soft material around it. It keeps the tool from bouncing around and keeps it safe from damage in shipping. The box is also plastic wrapped, this should keep moisture out of the box and prevents the scanner from being destroyed. The manual is pretty simple. I’m thankful they included the manual because I forgot it inside my house and I was trying to press and hold the button on the scan tool to connect it to my phone, but after reading the manual I realized all I had to do was press the button. Now I can connect it to my phone every time easily. Using their iOS app, updating the scan tool was easy, I wish it was slightly clearer what firmware your scan tool is currently on, but maybe I just overlooked it. Updating the firmware was pretty fast and I had no issues. A huge bonus of this device is the support for multiple apps and devices. This opens up a world of possibilities, you can keep the scan tool in your car and if you have an issue then plug it in and you can scan your car with your phone no matter where you are. If you have a compatible vehicle then Forscan is an amazing app. I was using the paid iOS version and the vLinker FS Bluetooth had no problem connecting at all, it was actually much faster than my older scan tool so this was very surprising. It connects in less than half the time, this may not seem like a big deal, but if you’re dealing with a car problem on the side of the road, the faster you get stuff done the better. The tool connects to Forscan in around 4-5 seconds. I had no connection issues at all and it scanned all modules that my car was compatible with. I tried to connect it to an iOS app called “Car Scanner ELM OBD2” but it didn\\\'t seem to support iOS 17 yet so I was unable to test that. That’s not an issue on the scan tool at all, the app just hasn’t been updated to support the new iPhone operating system that just came out. I’m running a beta software anyway so some app compatibility issues are to be expected. OBD Auto Doctor worked great as expected. Connecting it to a PC was easy, I was running Windows 11 and had no issues connecting it to Forscan. Using Forscan, it says that this adapter’s delay is 8ms which is really fast for a Bluetooth adapter, most that I’ve seen run around 16-18ms. Finding all these new modules I can scan on my vehicle made me very excited. I can diagnose things that I didn’t even know I could scan for. On my particular vehicle I didn’t know I could scan my AC, satellite radio system, power mirrors, car lighting system, electric seats, parking sensors, and other modules. This would have helped me a lot a year ago when I was fixing my AC and power mirrors. If you’re after a low cost, high performance scan tool then this is perfect for you. It has all the features of the more expensive brands without the cost. I’d recommend it for anyone, you can buy two for less than the cost of another brand, allowing you to keep one in different vehicles. I might pick up more in the future to keep one in each of my vehicles or give to family. I was pleasantly surprised and I know you will be too. I went into this expecting to have some kind of real suggestions or problems I’d like fixed, but honestly this is an amazing product and I wouldn’t hesitate to pick up another. It blows my old scan tool out of the water. I look forward to using this in the future to diagnose my vehicles and other people’s. This tool is very powerful when combined with proper software. Find a good software for your car and you’ll be amazed at what all data you can get. Swapping to this tool allowed me to have several more self tests among at least a hundred or so other opens that weren’t available previously. The depth that I can scan with it is astounding. I know I’ve repeated this point, but it’s because it’s true and it even scanned stuff I had no idea my car supported scanning. I would have never guessed that the car can move the mirrors and seats by itself to make sure it all works like it’s supposed to, I didn’t know that my car can automatically play with the AC, check pressures, etc and make sure my AC is working properly. The amount of hassle this tool could have saved me in the past makes me strongly regret old purchases and not getting this sooner. I found out that my car’s PCM may have an update and I was able to set my transmission to relearn shifts and this helped my car drive better. Previously I would have some issues where the car would hunt for what RPM it was supposed to shift at, but a relearn process and a bit of driving helped fix this. The car I did all of this on was older than 2010 so I can’t imagine what all this can do on a newer car like a 2018 or even a 2023 car. Even if you don’t want to use all these extra features or you’re too nervous to mess with any advanced options, this tool will allow you to scan and clear a bunch of codes you didn’t realize you had, even if a check engine light is not on. I’m really looking forward to using other Vgate products, this one really had me pleasantly surprised and I might pick up a few in the future to give to family.

Recommendation: No

Quality 

Great

Perfect compatibility with Forscan in my car