Vehicle cabin thermal management systems and methods

A method of thermally preconditioning a vehicle comprising:

• receiving information indicative of an upcoming trip;
• sensing a vicinity temperature from a vehicle sensor;
• receiving location temperature data from a remote source;
• activating a climate control system to precondition a cabin in advance of the upcoming trip;
• setting a first precondition criterion based on the vicinity temperature when the vicinity temperature is within a threshold range of the location temperature data;
• and
• setting a second precondition criterion based on the location temperature data when the vicinity temperature is outside of the threshold range.

A vehicle comprising:

• a climate control system to thermally precondition a passenger cabin;
• a sensor to output a vicinity temperature;
• a transceiver to receive location temperature data from a remote source;
• and
• a controller programmed to
• activate the climate control system in advance of an upcoming trip,
• achieve a first precondition start time based on the vicinity temperature when the vicinity temperature is within a threshold range of the location temperature data, and
• achieve a second precondition start time based on the location temperature data when the vicinity temperature is outside of the threshold range.