Apple Says CarPlay Now Available in Over 800 Vehicle Models as GM Plans to Phase Out Support in EVs

[alchemistmuffin]

Android Auto and CarPlay are both going away for a fully integrated system. They want users to pay a subscription service for access to the online features of the infotainment systems.

This is exact reason why Apple is building their own car right now, that is much better and will absolutely change the auto industry. And will likely destroy Tesla.

You won't need an Android phone - the in-built system will run Android and use Google apps (Maps etc), no phone needed (like the Polestar system)

Which will require Android phone for seamless integration since the built in system uses Android. Phone’s going to be needed likely for initial setup and that’s where Android phone comes in.

 

[leonmckee]

No CarPlay. No GM.

 

[timber]

True, but the point remains the same. Apple is the one who made subscription-everything a thing. It's pretty rich to complain about other companies wanting to generate subscription revenue while giving Apple a pass. Furthermore, all of these comments about GM wanting to charge for air conditioning and things like that are just plain stupid. We have no idea what GM is doing and we won't know for years.

While I don't like or pay most of Apple subscriptions and could talks a lot about their offerings the fact is that in most if not all of them you have options even in Apple's ecosystem.
For video, for music, for storage, even for stuff nominally free like maps the re options. And the same can be said in Android.
In a car if GM get's their way you either pay them or are completely locked out of very nice functionality.
It's understandable they would like o pull this one of but they are going at it exactly the wrong way. Tesla has managed to do it by at the same time offering a overall competitive advantage (the car itself) and being somewhat competent in their offering.
Still, I believe most Tesla owner's would like AA/CP if they could and as the competition offers more EVs their time to feel the heat will arrive.

 

[jz0309]

Electric cars can't backfire.

BMW was able to code misfiring cylinders sounds, so yes, you could do the same to an EV

 

[J___o___h___n]

I would never buy a car without CarPlay, it’s that simple.

 

[BillCarson]

I can't help but wonder if this is a prelude to the rumored Apple car. Consider that there's been rumors of an Apple car for several years. If Apple does actually start producing their own car, then no other manufacturers would tolerate any type of Apple branding in their vehicles. Maybe GM has some inside info on an impending Apple car and is therefore getting a jump on the situation by ditching Apple now.

 

[Radeon85]

Can see GM crawling back quickly enough and putting carplay back in. It's not a small change as it vastly effects the UI, music, navigation and communication experience. Stupid decision.

I want to get into a car and not mess around navigating a poorly made UI, with wireless carplay I just pick my destination or music before even stepping into the car if I want to then just get in and go.

 

[davenet]

I guess this now means GM will be the "Android" of cars.

 

[jaytv111]

I love the wireless CarPlay in my car. I wonder if us 'regular' CarPlay users will get an upgraded experience when the next gen CarPlay is introduced later this year?

Obviously I'm not expecting the next-gen features such as climate controls, etc. but it would be nice if we had a bit of a upgrade - maybe even basic widgets, etc. 🤞

Probably some UI tweaks but nothing major if you don't have 'new' Carplay. Maybe they'll add weather finally!

I have to believe that close to 90% of people buying expensive EV’s in the US are also using iPhones. They must be getting an awfully big check from Google to be doing this.

Google's actually pretty agnostic to Carplay. Android Automotive is the backbone of the new GM system, and it is already out in Volvo, Polestar, even GM! And it fully supports Carplay.

I still don't see how GM thinks this is a good move. Everyone we know who has CarPlay in the car loves it. GM is shooting themselves in the foot. I wouldn't buy a car without it - unless there were no other options.

GM has said they want subscription revenue to increase greatly. They say they will have several years of free Google Maps but other services and apps? Probably will have an infotainment package you need to pay for (to get Spotify and others). If you don't like it, you use Bluetooth like it's the year 2010.

 

[mattopotamus]

You have to use a button buried in a touchscreen menu to open the glove box on a Tesla. That is the opposite of a good UI

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For all of those crucial mid driving moments where you need to enter your glovebox? It's literally on the main controls page.

 

[7149041]

I still don't see how GM thinks this is a good move.

It sounds pretty dumb. I'd never buy a car with no Carplay. Especially in the US where iOS has the majority of mobile market share (55% or so?).

Unless the new system somehow works with iPhones.

 

[cmcbhi]

he killer is not the absence of Car Play.
It's the partnership with Google.
Nope, nope nope.

 

[RodThePlod]

Probably the best candidates are vehicles where CarPlay is able to project navigation directions in the instrument cluster/heads up display. Those are already interacting with the car's communication network in some way. I know the Ford Mustang Mach-E also interacts with Apple CarPlay Maps to route along charging stations

Yeah - I agree. Which means I may be out of luck then! Even though my car does have a digital instrument cluster, CarPlay only shows on the main 'infotainment' screen, and not in the instrument cluster. I guess it's just not supported.

Doesn't show in the HUD either, which is annoying as I'd like driving directions and arrows from Carplay Maps to show in there in the same way that they do for the car's inbuilt/native nav system. Oh well...

 

[JamesHolden]

For me, it's not CarPlay for the sake of CarPlay?

It's that this will both be used to collect and sell consumer data, and push consumers into endless subscriptions for what many think of as basic features after you get past a certain price point with cars.. Seat heaters? That'll be $30 a month. Intermittent wipers? $15/mo...

Do you have a shred of proof that charging for seat heater functionality is GM’s intention?

Let’s assume that it is. Why is this bad? Right now you pay extra for seat heaters. It’s an up-sell feature. You decide you don’t want them, they aren’t worth the extra cost. So you opt for no heaters. Winter comes and your fanny is freezing every morning on the way to work. Too bad you didn’t spring for those heaters! If only they were a subscription feature you could activate…

I’m fine with the idea of buying a basic vehicle and only paying for features I want. That said, I think it’s crazy to believe that any car company will charge for basic features like AC.

In many ways this is no different than what we experience today as Apple users. Most third party software is a subscription now. Lots of apps offer different subscription tiers that unlock additional features. If this business model bothers you, I dare say you’re supporting the wrong company every time you buy an Apple device. Adobe and Microsoft might have made subscriptions a thing in the business world, but it’s Apple who proved the model in the consumer space. If - and that’s all it is now, a big IF - GM plans to make certain features subscription, they learned from the App Store.

I think it's actually a GOOD thing that they decided to toss the baby out with the bathwater and try for both at the same time by saying "No CarPlay", because the CarPlay aspect will generate more attention to the issue outside the "Car People" circles where people are already honked off about this bull-butter.

Well, make sure to thank Apple for creating such a delicious bull-butter market!

The more consumer outrage at all of this, the better.

Lol. Consumer outrage. For five minutes. And then the herd moves on to the next faux outrage.

Like it or not, subscriptions are here to stay. And they also make a lot of sense. Consumers only pay for what they want/need. Businesses gain a much better appreciation for what is important to their customers and create a consistent revenue steam that provides stability, which benefits both the business and its customers.

My big problem with subscriptions is when businesses overvalue their products. I see this in the App Store all the time. I’ve seen “habit tracker” apps with $10/month subscription costs. Ridiculous. Then there are apps like Parcel that are very useful and very fairly priced at $5/year.

 

[compwiz1202]

It may be daft, but there are plenty of people for whom this could be a main differentiator, including me. And in the end, GM wants to sell cars even to daft people.

Yea I don't understand why someone should settle when you can have a car for 10+ years. And cosmetic stuff like color is way less important than a feature.

 

[xpxp2002]

Unpopular opinion: Presumably GM knows what they're doing and would not take the step of removing CarPlay if market research showed it would actually sway decisions for consumers who have landed on a specific GM vehicle they want to purchase. That's all they care about. They don't really care about opinions on tech sites, most of them from people who aren't even in the market for a car.

To put it another way, you know how most of you love to bring up how noisy MR forums are with love for the iPhone Mini, but then when sales data comes in it's a tiny 5% or less? For GM that's this situation.

As somebody who loves my iPhone minis and doesn't understand how anybody would ever want a phone bigger than this, I fear you're 100% correct. Not enough people will pay attention, care, and be in the market for a GM-made EV to make a noticeable difference in sales.

I also don't understand how anybody could buy a car without CarPlay in 2023, let alone wireless CarPlay now. But I also know plenty of people, like my in-laws, who have a a flip phone and couldn't care less. They don't even use wired CarPlay or Android Auto in their current GM vehicle since they don't have an iPhone or supported Android phone. They also are not the market for an EV, but CarPlay support wouldn't even be on their list of features that would make-or-break the sale for them.

There are plenty of people who will just use whatever infotainment system they get with their vehicle, or just use Bluetooth if that's the only connectivity that's available. Or they'll buy the vehicle assuming it must support CarPlay because their 2018 model did, and find out after it's too late and GM made the sale.

The only thing that might turn this around is that GM is only doing this on their EV models. The people who are most likely to have an iPhone and consider CarPlay a necessary feature to make a new car purchase are also the most likely crowd to be interested in an EV. Ironically, the ICE vehicles that "tech-forward" people are less likely to buy will continue to have CarPlay and Android Auto support.

My personal view is that this will suppress GM's EV sales, not enough to make them reconsider supporting CarPlay but enough that it looks like Americans aren't as interested in EVs as the media would have you believe. The reality is that I'm very much interested in an EV and would have only considered buying a GM EV prior to this news. But now, I'll probably hold onto my GM car with its ICE and wired CarPlay support for another few years and re-evaluate the options in 2026 or later. Hopefully by then Apple will have a new iPhone mini available too.

 

[jwdsail]

Sort of like how Apple has pushed everyone to a subscription model for software? Apple fans need a cold hard dose of reality. All of this subscription madness we're seeing today is because of Apple. Apple proved that it is both easy and highly profitable to nickel and dime your customers forever, so of course everyone else wants to get in on the action.

Huh..

You sure about that?

I'm trying to think of a single Apple subscription I have, and I'm failing...

I own my MBP outright, with AppleCare..

Ditto with the iPhone SE...

I don't pay for additional iCloud storage?
I'd rather light myself on fire than rent music from any streaming service, Apple or otherwise?
I subscribe to AppleTV+ maybe one month a year, haven't so far this year..
Fitness+? Nope.
News? Nope..

And, when it comes to subscriptions nickel and dimeing customers to death, I think the cable companies have everyone else beat, and have for decades.

Cell service companies coming in a close 2nd place.

And when it comes to subscriptions for software, Adobe and the $%^&! at Intuit are probably the all time champions, hands down.

 

[mannyvel]

With the new GM infotainment system, law enforcement can now track individuals more accurately and effectively than ever before. No more inaccurate cell triangulation and messy carrier subpoenas - with the GM system you can get all the historical location data you need for your investigation at meter-level accuracy from one source.

GM - Technology for Tomorrow Today.

 

[MallardDuck]

For all of those crucial mid driving moments where you need to enter your glovebox? It's literally on the main controls page.

Ditto to unlock the doors, open the charging port, etc. Incredibly frustrating that I can't just hit a button - on the passenger door - to unlock all the doors. As for driving? The fonts are tiny and important information (like your speed) is placed on the screen in a way that it's blocked by your hand on the steering wheel. If you want to change the temperature, you have to look at the screen to find the right place to touch, swipe up, fiddle with the setting. Much easier (and safer!) to have an analog dial that you simply reach down and turn without taking your hands off the road.

A screen is fine for displaying information while driving (if the fonts were bigger and placement better), but to operate controls while driving it's horrible.

 

[gsurf123]

The awesomeness of android auto and CarPlay is that even though the entertainment system built into the car is obsolete. You will always be current as long as these are available in your car. That is something that auto makers don’t like.

 

[name99]

agreed, I just want the wireless version for my car model and make its the 2023 model so I will have to get it later on

The carplay wireless adaptors on AMZ, around $100, are not bad. I hooked mine up to a USB toggle switch glued under it so that when it gets confused (happens about twice a month) I can just toggle the switch off then on again to reset it and it's back to normal.

I was also pleasantly surprised that my more recent rental car not only had CarPlay but had wireless CarPlay. Just included by default, not even something we asked for or paid extra for! The car rental companies seem to have an understanding of what their customers expect...

 

[name99]

That may be the case, but that hasn't prevented Tesla from not including CarPlay in its cars. But, unfortunately for GM, GM is not Tesla when it comes to EV market dominance and can ill afford such stunts.

Tesla is probably on borrowed time in this respect.
They have been able to succeed based on the combination of
- people wanted electric (for various different reasons)
- their UI was good enough
- the charging network is great and easy/convenient to use (along with home charging)

But as the charging network seems to moving towards cross-brand functionality (one step, one law, at a time, but that's where we're headed) and as other brands provide nice electrics WITH Car Play this will start to play out rather differently.
I know for example one female friend who has zero strong opinions on tech (car or phone), she just knows that she likes CarPlay's navigation much more than anything else. Combination of
- the voice sounds more realistic [Tesla is very harsh, Google somewhat harsher]
- Siri doesn't speak too often [Google is far too chatty]
- Siri speaks at just the right time in advance, and with good explanations [ie go through this light then turn left at the next light, not "turn left in 800 yards"]

This matters to her enough that I set up her Tesla so that she gets Apple Maps/Siri navigation by bluetooth audio, and uses that all that time, in preference to native Tesla navigation...

 

[Razorpit]

Do you have a shred of proof that charging for seat heater functionality is GM’s intention?

Let’s assume that it is. Why is this bad? Right now you pay extra for seat heaters. It’s an up-sell feature. You decide you don’t want them, they aren’t worth the extra cost. So you opt for no heaters. Winter comes and your fanny is freezing every morning on the way to work. Too bad you didn’t spring for those heaters! If only they were a subscription feature you could activate…

I’m fine with the idea of buying a basic vehicle and only paying for features I want. That said, I think it’s crazy to believe that any car company will charge for basic features like AC.

In many ways this is no different than what we experience today as Apple users. Most third party software is a subscription now. Lots of apps offer different subscription tiers that unlock additional features. If this business model bothers you, I dare say you’re supporting the wrong company every time you buy an Apple device. Adobe and Microsoft might have made subscriptions a thing in the business world, but it’s Apple who proved the model in the consumer space. If - and that’s all it is now, a big IF - GM plans to make certain features subscription, they learned from the App Store.


Well, make sure to thank Apple for creating such a delicious bull-butter market!


Lol. Consumer outrage. For five minutes. And then the herd moves on to the next faux outrage.

Like it or not, subscriptions are here to stay. And they also make a lot of sense. Consumers only pay for what they want/need. Businesses gain a much better appreciation for what is important to their customers and create a consistent revenue steam that provides stability, which benefits both the business and its customers.

My big problem with subscriptions is when businesses overvalue their products. I see this in the App Store all the time. I’ve seen “habit tracker” apps with $10/month subscription costs. Ridiculous. Then there are apps like Parcel that are very useful and very fairly priced at $5/year.

This may be the worst take I've seen yet. So let me understand, you want to pay for seat heaters when you buy the vehicle, then pay monthly to use them? 😂 Then you completely contradict yourself with the AC example. As much as heated seats don't make sense to people in Mexico, AC might not make sense to a lot of Canadians. Why does one make more sense than the other? Where would it stop?

You do realize the price of the hardware is going to be included in the price of the vehicle whether you use them or you don't? That wiring harness isn't free. Software add-ons and hardware add-ons are two different things.

Subscriptions are here as long as we continue to partake in them. When we stop, they will stop, (as long as true capitalism exists).

 

[monstermash]

I gotta say there are SO MANY more options in a car more important than CarPlay I'm surprised that everybody gets bent out of shape.

Most of those "options" are stuff I don't care about.

Hell, many of the "standard" features are stuff I don't care about.

You know what I really want? A BASIC, CHEAP CAR, without all of the extra crap on it. I'll take a real spare tire, Airbags, AWD, CarPlay and a train horn.

Don't need or what:

1. Anything involving RADAR, LIDAR or other external sensors, including any self-driving or self-parking function
   • Brake assist​
   • Collision warnings​
   • Automatic emergency braking​
   • Pedestrian detection​
   • Adaptive Cruise Control​
   • Blind Spot Warning​
   • Rear cross-traffic alert​
   • Lane Keeping Assist​
2. Anything other than a basic safety glass windshield
3. TMPS
4. Run flat tires
5. Automatic headlights
6. telematics

 

[macnylonguitar]

Once again, if I didn't already have a ton of reasons to never buy an american made car, I now have another!
GM, the entire Apple iPhone ecosystem with it's millions and millions of users, just crossed GM of their list of car manufacturers...Smart move