Apple’s Car Key might seem like a no-brainer. Ditch your bulky and expensive-to-replace car fob and instead simply use your iPhone or Apple Watch to unlock your car.
But while you might expect iPhone owners to be eager to use it, and car makers keen to meet this demand, a new report suggests that there are three barriers to wider adoption …
A quick recap on Apple’s Car Key
Launched back in 2020, Apple’s Car Key feature lets you turn your iPhone or Apple Watch into a digital key that can lock, unlock, and start your car.
The digital key feature supports both NFC for tap-to-operate and ultra-wideband for automatic unlocking as you approach your vehicle with your Apple device.
Digital car keys have a whole host of benefits. If you want to make additional keys available to family members, you don’t need to pay the carmaker a hefty price for an extra fob. The way in which it works means it’s impossible to lock yourself out of your car. It’s more secure, because Car Key is protected against relay attacks used by thieves with radio scanners to capture codes. You have greater flexibility, such as creating time-limited keys for use by valets and mechanics, as well as doing things like creating a limited key for your children that allows them to unlock and enter the car but not to start it.
But adoption by carmakers has been slow, and some car owners whose vehicles support the feature don’t yet use it. A Wired report suggests there are three main barriers to more widespread adoption of the technology.
Compatibility, and carmaker reluctance
The first problem is that not all vehicles are able to support Car Key. Some manufacturers stick to their own proprietary digital keys, while some families may have a mix of iPhones and Android smartphones. There isn’t yet a single universal standard for digital keys that could be adopted by all manufacturers and smartphone brands.
That’s something the Car Connectivity Consortium is working to change, and Apple is a member. However, a universal standard will take time to roll out, and some manufacturers may be reluctant to adopt it.
Kelly Blue Book’s Sean Tucker isn’t so sure. “There’s tension between automakers who may say they want a common standard but who don’t necessarily want to share the data that [digital keys] collect,” he says. “Apple CarPlay was adopted quickly because it’s convenient, and users like it a lot. But automakers realized that Apple collects data on how the car gets used, and automakers would rather collect that data themselves so that they can monetize it […]
Automakers also want to squeeze customers for subscription income, and if they bundle digital key use in with paid-for apps it’s likely that uptake will be stunted.
It’s a similar issue to CarPlay where consumers definitely want it, but some manufacturers are reluctant for this reason.
Consumer ignorance
Even owners of cars that currently support Car Key may not be aware of it, and the same is even true of some dealers.
Tucker isn’t optimistic. “People already don’t know about loads of features on their cars, and dealers also often don’t know about them or don’t devote enough time to explaining them to consumers. For more than a decade, Ford Lincolns have been able to parallel park themselves, but in recent software updates, Ford discovered that almost no one has ever used the feature. I wonder if there are a lot of Polestar drivers out there who have no idea they have access to a digital key?”
Psychological barriers
Finally, the the report suggests that there may be psychological barriers to greater adoption.
“A car key is full of meaning,” says Stefan Gössling, a professor at Linnaeus University, Sweden, and author of The Psychology of the Car. “Jingling them gives some motorists the opportunity to show off their automobile, even if the car is not close by.
Car keys are also comforting to some, a physical reminder that your vehicle is there to take you away; to protect you.”
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