Is CarPlay Ultra Coming to Your Car? (Spoiler: Probably Not)
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After nearly three years of leaving us waiting, Apple unveiled its next-generation “CarPlay Ultra” last month, revolutionizing the dashboard for the customers of at least one vehicle maker. Sadly, if you’re hoping that the powerful new CarPlay experience will come to something more affordable than a $250,000 Aston Martin DBX, you may be in for a wait.
When Apple announced the new CarPlay in June 2022, it listed over a dozen automakers as potential partners, including Ford, Lincoln, Mercedes-Benz, Infiniti, Honda, Acura, Jaguar, Land Rover, Audi, Nissan, Volvo, and Porsche. It also promised we’d see the first vehicles with the new technology by the end of 2023. Still, as the calendar pages kept flipping, automakers remained relatively silent, with the few that would talk about it at all being noncommittal at best.
While Apple technically met its end-of-2023 deadline when Porsche and Aston Martin previewed the new interface in December of that year, it wasn’t until last month’s announcement that these plans solidified into something tangible. Some 2024 models introduced a partial implementation with deeper integration into in-car systems, which some called CarPlay+, but that fell short of the fully Apple-designed dashboard that would ultimately become CarPlay Ultra.
The challenge Apple has faced with this next-generation CarPlay since its inception has been that carmakers are as serious about their brands as Apple is about its own. Companies weren’t eager to hand their dashboards over to Apple, even if it was willing to spend time and effort building a bespoke interface tailored for each brand.
When Apple finally announced CarPlay Ultra, the list of automakers had seemingly shrunk dramatically from its 2022 ambitions. While Apple said that “many other automakers around the world are working to bring CarPlay Ultra to drivers,” it only listed one by name: Hyundai, along with its Kia and Genesis brands.
A new report from the Financial Times provides more insight into why some of these names have disappeared from Apple’s list, and it’s not much different than what Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman said in January:
What incentive do the carmakers have to do this? The new CarPlay mostly benefits Apple and gives the company a stronghold in any vehicle that uses the software. Many automakers are loath to hand over their center consoles to a company that spent $10 billion trying to design a car that could replace them.
Mark Gurman
While Gurman didn’t name any names, the Financial Times report does. According to its sources, the only four automakers who admitted they were even considering CarPlay in 2022 have all since pulled out.
Just after Apple announced the new CarPlay three years ago, The Verge contacted 12 major automakers about their plans. Most refused to comment on future plans, but Volvo and Polestar both committed to supporting the next-generation of CarPlay in future vehicles, while BMW and Mercedes-Benz were a bit more vague, saying only that they were committed to exploring the idea and continuing to work with Apple on the latest technologies to “continue the seamless integration of Apple’s ecosystem,” as the BMW spokesperson put it.
However, the Financial Times reports that these companies have since declined to participate in CarPlay Ultra.
German luxury brands Mercedes-Benz and Audi as well as Volvo Cars, Polestar and Renault said they had no plans to bring the upgraded software to their vehicles, despite earlier indications from Apple that they would. […] BMW said it would integrate the existing Apple CarPlay with its new design, while Audi said its focus was to offer drivers “a customised and seamless digital experience” so it would not use CarPlay Ultra although the standard version was available on its vehicles.
The Financial Times
While Volvo isn’t on board, the company’s chief executive conceded that carmakers should recognize that there’s a place for tech companies to get involved. “There are others who can do that better, and then we should offer that in our cars,” he said.
On the flip side, Renault put it much more bluntly, suggesting that Apple is overreaching. The French automaker is working with Google and Qualcomm to build a system that it has more control over, and told Apple not to “invade” its systems.
Of the list of 14 carmakers that Apple shared in 2022, only Jaguar Land Rover told the Financial Times that it was “still evaluating the system.” The others have either bowed out or refused to comment. Meanwhile, Hyundai, which was conspicuously missing from the list in 2022, has become Apple’s “newly committed” partner.
Still, there’s no word on which Hyundai, Kia, or Genesis models will see CarPlay Ultra or when. Hyundai was the first after BMW to roll out support for Apple Car Key, starting with its Genesis GV60 and G90 and later expanding to the Genesis G70, Hyundai Palisade and IONIQ 6, and the Kia Telluride, Niro, Seltos, and EV9. These will likely be the models to eventually sport CarPlay Ultra, but the company has not announced any specifics.
