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You've done your research. There are a few minor internal changes but nothing that I'm aware has been extensively published. There was a small mention about air flow rerouting via the air shutter to go 'under the car' rather than out - internally this can be seen as the air flow is now drastically reduced making it a little challenge if you wish to get the pre-LCI bonnet vent working back to how it was - the cooling is reduced in the LCI. Shame they didn't omit this change and leave it only for the roadster as it's a damn cool vent (pre-LCI), but the LCI vent has grown on my gradually.
I'm going to go so far as to say if the tax saving of £150/£400ish (or whatever it is) extra per year is a factor in your decision, then look at the mileage you are anticipating to do (is it a weekend car? daily drive? Etc). The range difference is so much different in the LCI (a true 25-30 miles vs 10-12) that it makes commuting a very viable proposition. If your trips are above 12 miles but not much more than 30 miles you will save a lot of money on fuel (presuming you're happy to go all electric) - I get 68mpg over the last 2500 miles, that's mainly commuting of 40 mile trips twice a week and 60 mile trips twice a week. I do 12,000 so the tax savings pale in comparison to the fuel savings. If your mileage is low and you do very short trips not more than 12 miles then it won't matter if you get a pre-LCI.
Of course don't forget that you can't just look at cost of MPG, (which is easy to try and do when you justify the more expensive car vs the cheaper one) you've bought the car to drive!
The carplay is useless (as it is in general) - forget it - the BMW integrated nav is far better.
Really for the LCI, you're not paying much more really for them and there isn't a price premium really - essentially the LCI upgrades are free, they're just consistent with the age and mileage given the pricing. That is to say, an October 18 pre-LCI is very similarly priced to a November/December 18 LCI of the same mileage. That makes the LCI pretty good value for the same mileage/age!
If I were deciding it would have to be a pre March 17 model or a November 18 onwards LCI, but not much inbetween, as the inbetween models have full tax and no LCI extras, the worst of both worlds. I don't understand why April 17 -> October 18 models aren't cheaper, but they seem to be relatively linear regardless of the fact they are not LCI.
The later models came with slightly more kit as standard, but it's marginal as they were all well equiped. The LCIs do come with carplay but as above it's rubbish. The LCI does come with a much improved heads up.
What I would do is decide how much you would want to spend, and then decide on colour scheme. There were only 119 ish LCIs released (excluding roadsters) and the colour schemes are extremely limited. I wanted sophisto grey/frosted accents with dalbergia tan, and the one I bought is the only one I've come across in the last 3 months. Similarly I only know of one Donington grey that was sold just before mine. There are plenty of good colour schemes available pre-LCI, but post LCI there's only a handful and most involve the blue accent which you may or may not like, and the majority have black interiors (not to my taste). I only know of two so far with ivory leather in LCI trim.
I hope this helps, I plan to write a daily drive post soon as I've had mine for nearly 3 months!
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