CarPlay

Apple hasn’t had much luck persuading car makers to adopt its next-gen CarPlay, in which its own UI takes over all or most of the vehicle’s displays. But a feature known as punch-through might be the compromise which gets the company at least some of the way there.

Punch-through was initially designed to allow the car’s own UI to take over in very limited cases, like automatically engaging backup cameras when reverse gear is selected, but it could be applied more generally to keep everyone happy …

Plans for the rollout of the next-gen CarPlay don’t seem to be going too well. Despite Porsche being announced as one of the first companies in line to support it, the company has implied that its first hybrid Porsche 911 won’t include it.

The German sports car maker says that the $164k 2025 Porsche 911 Carrera GTS will see CarPlay “integrated more deeply into the vehicle,” but went on to imply that this doesn’t mean it will be the next-generation experience Apple first announced almost two years ago …

Last week, Mercedes-Benz CEO Ola Källenius made it clear that the automaker has no plans to support Apple’s next-generation CarPlay platform.

In a new interview with The Verge, Polestar CEO Thomas Ingenlath took a different approach and said that he would be open to giving Apple control over all the screens in a Polestar car.

A little over a year ago, General Motors made what may well turn out to be one of its biggest gambles in many years: dropping support for CarPlay for all future EVs.

To most of us, the decision seemed insane, likely to result in a huge number of lost sales – but a new report suggests that the company felt it had little choice …

The stock head unit with wired CarPlay in my 2017 Honda Civic EX recently gave up the ghost. The most affordable solution was a greatly upgraded aftermarket head unit from a brand called JOYING. It’s a 9-inch display with wireless CarPlay, a volume knob, and a design made for 10th-gen Honda Civics. It retails well below $500 and is worth every penny.

Apple unveiled its next generation of CarPlay at WWDC in 2022, then announced last year that its first partners would be Porsche and Aston Martin.

In an interview today, Mercedes-Benz CEO Ola Källenius made it clear that the company has no plans to adopt next-generation CarPlay – despite being touted by Apple as a partner.

Apple CarPlay is the safest way to interact with your iPhone in the car. You never need to touch your iPhone while driving – something you should never ever do anyway. Instead, you control navigation, communication, and entertainment with voice control and a simplified interface on your car’s screen.

What if your car doesn’t have a built-in display? What if it has one that doesn’t work with Apple CarPlay? The good news is you don’t have to go out and buy a brand new car. In most cases, you can have a really good in-dash system installed for anywhere from $200 to $1,000. Picking the right solution before you make the investment is important.

One of the big changes in iOS 17 for CarPlay users is the addition of SharePlay support for Apple Music. This feature allows anyone in the car to control and contribute to what’s playing via Apple Music, rather than just one person.

I took SharePlay for Apple Music in iOS 17 for a recent drive. My takeaway? This is a very, very fun feature.

The DOJ lawsuit is 88 pages long, and I freely confess I haven’t yet finished reading it, but it seems one tech writer has – finding a claim that CarPlay is anticompetitive.

As the piece notes, it seems clear that the Department of Justice doesn’t actually understand what CarPlay is, or how it works, as the claim simply makes no sense …

Apple’s iOS 17.4 software update for iPhone is now available. It features major App Store changes in the EU, new emoji for everyone, and a slight update to CarPlay.

Here’s how Apple describes the CarPlay update in iOS 17.4:

CarPlay has graduated from a niche upgrade option to a mainstream standard feature in new cars, replacing clunky radio user interfaces with a design very familiar for iPhone users. But before Apple set CarPlay loose in the wild, the world was shown a very different design for Apple’s infotainment feature under a different name.

Sunday marks 10 years since Apple publicly rebranded “iOS in the Car” as CarPlay. Here’s a look back:

As someone who’s been covering the ins and outs of Project Titan for the past decade, I can’t say I’m surprised by this week’s news that the infamous Apple Car has been cancelled.

My hope, however, is that the death of Apple Car means there are good things to come for CarPlay users.

Apple today released iOS 17.4 beta 4 to developers, and it includes a notable new CarPlay feature. According to Apple, Apple Maps in iOS 17.4 will show a “new instrument cluster experience with information about upcoming maneuvers” with supported CarPlay vehicles.

Earlier this month, Honda announced its preliminary plans to offer a CarPlay retrofit to Honda Accord drivers. The company has now shared more details on this plan, revealing that the software update will start at $112 and be available at any authorized Honda dealer.

Honda explains that this software update will enable wireless CarPlay and Android Auto on approximately 631,000 Accord models from the 2018-2022 model years.

CarPlay is a few weeks away from turning 10 … depending on when you celebrate its birthday. Apple has already promised a whole new generation of CarPlay will start taking over cars in 2024. Now assets in iOS 17.4 beta show that CarPlay 2.0 really is getting closer to rolling off the new car lot.

Apple Musical Classical teased the world with an accidental CarPlay app this week, but SoundCloud has the real deal. At least for paid members of SoundCloud’s subscription service.

SoundCloud apparently isn’t just a place for uploading your mixtape. Still, if you land a viral tweet and need something to promote, SoundCloud is the go-to choice (unless you don’t have one).

Honda is planning to make a retrofit available to older model-year Accords to enable wireless CarPlay. The process will begin later this month and will require a trip to the dealer, Honda says.

Courtesy of Reddit user Confident_Tension_64, MyRadar for iPhone has been updated this month to include support for Apple CarPlay. This means drivers with MyRadar for iOS installed can now view weather radar maps from the car’s screen instead of the iPhone display.

While Polestar has taken a lot of steps to deepen its relationship with Google for in-car infotainment, the company says it’s still committed to CarPlay as well. In an interview at CES 2024 this week, Polestar CEO Thomas Ingenlath explained that it doesn’t make sense for the company to limit customers and remove the option of CarPlay.

I don’t need to remind you that GM is ditching CarPlay starting with its 2024 model year EVs. We’ve covered that news extensively over the past year, routinely pointing out that it may not be a very wise decision.

Some of the early real-world reviews of the 2024 Chevy Blazer EV have emerged, and it certainly doesn’t sound like GM’s “Ultifi” infotainment software is ready for prime time.

Apple has officially made good on its long-standing promise. The first cars with support for next-generation CarPlay have been announced. As reported by Cool Hunting and Car and Driver, Porsche and Aston Martin will be the first automakers to support next-generation CarPlay starting in 2024.

Notably, Aston Martin wasn’t on Apple’s original list of automakers that would support next-generation CarPlay.