Samsara has placed Mobile Experience Management (MEM) on end-of-sale. Samsara’s help centre describes purchases as limited to add-ons for existing MEM customers, with the product unavailable to new ones. Its help centre also covers the path forward: running the Samsara Driver App under a third-party mobile device management (MDM) platform.
If MEM is the layer keeping your driver devices configured, this is a decision you will have to make, and a smaller one than it first appears.
What MEM did, and what it did not
MEM is the part of Samsara that manages the mobile devices your drivers use: enrolling them into the Samsara dashboard and applying policies to them.
One naming note, because the two are easy to mix up. MEM is Samsara’s product name. MDM (mobile device management) is the general category of tool that does that job. So replacing MEM does not mean replacing a category; it means moving that job to a dedicated MDM platform. The rest of this piece uses MEM for Samsara’s module and MDM for the category.
You will also see the module called Samsara MDM informally, since that is what it does. Samsara’s own name for it is Mobile Experience Management, or MEM, so if you searched for Samsara MDM and landed here, this is the right page.
MEM is one module, not the whole platform. Your telematics, dashcams, electronic logging device (ELD) compliance and the Samsara dashboard your operations team works in are separate products, and the MEM change does not affect them. What you are losing is the device-management layer underneath.
End-of-sale, end-of-life and end-of-support are three different things
They get used interchangeably, and the difference decides your timeline.
- End-of-sale means the product can no longer be ordered. This is where MEM is now.
- End-of-life is the broader programme a vendor runs to retire a product.
- End-of-support is the date the vendor stops maintaining it. This is the date that sets your deadline.
Samsara has not published an end-of-support date for MEM. Its guidance is to speak to your account team. That is the right first call. Before you evaluate anything, find out how long you actually have.
Why the timeline matters more than it looks
A device-management layer is not something you can leave to age quietly. Android and iOS ship new major versions every year, and each one changes what a management platform has to handle: enrollment flows, permission models, restrictions. Once a product stops being maintained, the gap between what your fleet runs and what the platform was built for widens on its own.
For a fleet, that shows up in practical ways: a new device model that will not enroll, a policy that stops applying, a driver app that cannot be updated remotely. None of it is urgent on any particular day, which is exactly why it is worth putting a date on.
You are not leaving Samsara
Worth stating plainly, because it is the most common misreading: replacing MEM does not mean replacing Samsara.
MEM is one module, and the rest of your Samsara deployment is separate from it, so keeping Samsara and putting a device-management platform beneath it is the straightforward path.
Samsara covers this path too. Its help centre has an article on using the Samsara Driver App with a third-party MDM. That article sits behind a customer login, so you will need your Samsara account to open it. Worth raising with your account team alongside the end-of-support question.
So the question is not what do we switch to. It is what manages the devices now.
What the replacement layer has to do
Driver devices are a particular kind of fleet, and a general MDM checklist misses some of it. Worth testing in any evaluation, whoever you look at:
- Both platforms. The Samsara Driver App ships for Android and iOS. A mixed fleet needs a management layer that covers both.
- Getting the app on the device, and keeping it there. Silent install, version control, and the ability to stop a driver uninstalling it.
- Locking the device to its job. A driver device usually needs to run a short list of apps and little else. That is what single-app and multi-app kiosk modes do.
- Support without a site visit. A device mounted in a cab is not coming to the IT desk. Remote view and control matter more here than for an office fleet.
- Rugged hardware. Fleet devices are often Zebra, Honeywell or similar. Check that the platform supports the specific models you run.
- Enrollment at scale. Zero-touch or QR-based enrollment, so a device can be shipped to a driver and arrive already configured.
Running the Samsara Driver App under a third-party MDM
There is no integration to build. As Samsara’s own documentation puts it, “you can install the Samsara Driver App from the Google Play Store (Android) or the App Store (Apple iOS)”. The Driver App is a standard mobile app. So it is deployed and managed the same way as any other business app in your catalogue: add it, assign it, push it to a group.
One thing worth checking during a trial: if your management platform applies network restrictions such as a firewall, a secure web gateway or content filtering, make sure the Driver App can still reach the internet. A rule that catches it will stop it working, and it is a quick thing to rule out early.
Beyond that, it behaves like any managed app.
How Scalefusion fits
Deploying the Driver App is not a differentiator, because it is a standard mobile app that any MDM with application management can handle. Worth saying so directly, because the useful question is what happens around it.
Scalefusion manages Android, iOS and iPadOS, macOS, Windows, Linux and ChromeOS from one dashboard. For a fleet operation that usually matters more than it sounds: the driver handhelds are one part of the estate, and the back-office laptops, the depot terminals and the yard kiosks tend to be running something else. Managing them in one place rather than three is the part that compounds.
On top of that are the things a driver fleet leans on: kiosk lockdown, so a device runs the Driver App and little else, and remote support for hardware mounted in a vehicle. Then rugged device support, and enrollment that works when the device and the driver are in different places.
A Samsara MEM customer has already moved their device management to Scalefusion and kept Samsara for fleet operations. The Driver App runs under management on the same devices. It is how we learned MEM had gone end-of-sale.
A Samsara MEM migration checklist
- Ask your Samsara account team for the MEM end-of-support date. Everything else depends on it.
- Inventory what MEM does for you today: how many devices, which platforms, which policies, which apps.
- Write down the non-negotiables from that inventory before you look at any vendor.
- Trial with real devices, including the rugged models and the Samsara Driver App itself.
- Pilot on one depot or one route rather than the whole fleet.
- Migrate in groups, so a problem affects a handful of vehicles instead of all of them.
- Keep Samsara. Your fleet data, dashcams and compliance workflows stay where they are.
FAQs
Is Samsara MEM discontinued?
It is end-of-sale rather than switched off. Samsara’s documentation is explicit: existing customers can keep using it and can still buy add-ons, while new customers cannot buy it at all. Existing deployments continue to run.
What is the Samsara MEM end-of-life date?
Samsara has not published one. Its guidance is to contact your account team for end-of-support timelines, which is worth doing early, since the date determines how much time you have to plan.
Can I keep using Samsara MEM for now?
Yes, if you are already a MEM customer. End-of-sale restricts new purchases; it does not disable existing deployments. It does mean the clock has started, so it is worth knowing the end-of-support date.
Does the Samsara Driver App work with a third-party MDM?
Yes. The Driver App is a standard Android and iOS app, so any MDM with application management can deploy it. Samsara’s help centre has an article on the subject for its customers. One practical note: check that your management platform does not block the app from reaching the internet.
What are the Samsara MEM alternatives and replacement options?
A dedicated mobile device management or unified endpoint management platform, sitting underneath the Samsara apps you already use. What you need from it depends on your fleet: platforms, hardware, and whether devices need locking to a single app.
Do I have to stop using Samsara?
No. MEM is one module. Your telematics, dashcams and compliance workflows are separate products and are unaffected by the MEM change.
Talk to us about your fleet
If MEM is winding down and you are working out what manages your driver devices next, we are happy to walk through it with you, including running the Samsara Driver App under management on Android and iOS, and what a migration looks like for a fleet your size.
