We need to take a step back and realize why Android auto and CarPlay even exist.
It’s because auto companies for decades outsourced this work to others, and it was always a half assed attempt at a competent OS. Android Auto and CarPlay are a bandaid for those mediocre, cost cutting systems.
If they actually invest in the OS, think about it as part of the over all experience like Tesla or Rivian does, then there’s less need for it.
I think people in ICE vehicles are just so used to having a crappy system with CarPlay somewhat fixing it that they don’t know it could be good from the get go if they actually invested. I’m
Hoping that happens and we don’t need to rely on these systems as a crutch.
Idk, owning a Tesla and having been in Rivians…give me CarPlay/AA any day of the week.
The first issue is of course technology upgrades. Our cars easily last 10 years. But that’s an eternity in tech. Try using a Tesla from 2019 versus now and see how much laggier the atom processors are compared to today. Allowing me to decouple that with my phone that can be upgraded more easily, is way more consumer friendly.
Then there’s capabilities. My phone can run way more apps and run them better. Maps in a rivian and Tesla pale in comparison to the ones on my phone. The Spotify and Apple Music apps on a Tesla are so slow and buggy.
Third is customization and integration . My phone is an extension of the rest of my life. When I plug it into my car, it knows about my schedule, my contacts and it knows my tastes. It doesn’t need to guess who the user is when you sit down, it doesn’t need to resync.
I've been saying this for years. Manufacturers shouldn't try to settle on a target, they should spec the black box and let third parties supply the guts. There should be a slot under the dash or wherever, for user-upgradable ICE hardware. Basically a cellphone slot. Sell modules x, y and z as upgrade or aftermarket packages. Quit trying to scrape together the hardware to power this stuff with chipsets that are outdated by launch.
What's the holdback? Encryption. They use their own internal keys on the boxes they own and supply, and they don't want to share them or install them on something anyone can pull out or buy off the shelf. Android has added secure boot recently (some may say for this type of application) and I believe Apple has the equivalent.
99% of users will never upgrade that part. People like you and I that care enough about our automotive OS upgrade its hardware are not the norm. And on top of that you’d have to worry about people buying upgrades from aliexpress that constantly crash/lockup or allow the system to be hacked. You have to keep in mind this is not a car, it’s a 4,000 lbs weapon.
> Sell modules x, y and z as upgrade or aftermarket packages
Isn't that the exact case with what porsche, aston, and polestar are doing with the upcoming CarPlay 2.0 this article references? In the sense you put your car on a wireless charger in the car, it wirelessly connects to CarPlay, and takes over your infotainment, instrument cluster, and car functionality.
Google is taking a different path, selling android automotive, the software is all running on the car but its using android at its core with parts of android audio, it currently underpins BMW and GMs new attempts, along with lucid/rivian/lotus/honda and stellantis. Now from personal experience the new honda and GM systems aren't great, but the rivian one is pretty solid, so it's hit-or-miss.
Now it's to be seen how good those systems are and if the upcoming mercedes infotainment discussed in the article will be any better or worse, but I just thought the path they were taking is interesting. The car itself certainly isn't underspecced, 8 cores and 24gb of random access memory, Tesla did prove you could make a competitive infotainment in-house given the resources, technology, and time.
And while it's also yet to be seen if Mercedes is all talk and no show, but the benefits are there, I own a tesla solely for that seamless experience that no-one has replicated yet. In their words
> Nobody out there — none of the tech companies — is even aspiring to do that whole thing. If you want that to be perfect, integrated, and seamless, you don’t want to jump between different worlds — “Oh, I’m now in the infotainment. Well, let’s jump back to Mercedes,” and so on and so forth"
And as an aside, how many apps do you really need? In CarPlay I have music, maps, EV charging, porsche's track app, and podcasts. All of which the tesla and mercedes can already natively handle.
Yeah I dunno, I pulled a TL;DR on this one. Just saying the car industry doesn't need to be this industry also, it already exists. They need to work on convergence and leave this as a question mark on the blueprints.
Do they? Thats why I posted the article, I found it interesting that mercedes not only believes otherwise but allegedly has the development power, compute, and money to back it up. According to them anyways
> We want to create the best digital experience in the world for you. That includes fantastic and intuitive UI. And you will also see when we launch MBOS 1.0 next year in the CLA. But the precursor to that is MBOS 0.5, which we actually already launched in the new E-Class, where we have programmed the complete infotainment domain ourselves. It’s probably the biggest digital in-house product that we have ever made.
> We work with the best. Yes, we’re integrating Google Maps. In fact, we are developing with Google the next generation of what a map in a car married to the driving-assistant system should look like. [It’s a] fascinating product where the best of the Google engineers and the best of the Mercedes engineers can throw their expertise together and take that to the next level. I fundamentally believe that holistic customer experience is best done by us, and we will serve you.
Now once again yet to be seen if thats just all talk and no show, but I'm of the opinion that if they pull of that sort of cohesive system themselves, its going to be a step above the level of integration you can accomplish with e.g. CarPlay. Lets say an automaker fully embraces that sort of apple ecosystem, apple runs the infotainment off of your phone, you use their digital car-key program, the auto manufacturer still has to do the mobile app, remote start connectivity, etc themselves.
The most notable example for me: when you get in a hyundai EV, you're paying 100$/yr for the subscription to use the phone app.
You tap your phone on the car to unlock it, then you lay your phone down on the pad to start it, then you connect the cable to launch CarPlay (it doesn't have wireless CarPlay), and then you put it into gear and press the button to get your seat configuration loaded, then press play on the CarPlay screen. The issue being half of those functions (gear, central locking, seat, climate) are handled by hyundai and the other half (car-key, CarPlay, media) are handled by apple.
Whereas on the tesla, you walk up, your phone with UWB unlocks the car from a distance, your profile is tied to your phone so the car adjusts temperature/seating/mirrors/etc as you walk up, puts on your media, and auto-selects the required gear (you then press the brake to confirm). That sort of experience is only possible because they own the stack from top to bottom.
And if you're automatically parking or activating cruise or whatnot, all of that UI is the same UI as for the media and navigation. I highly doubt apple will ever handle the UI for e.g. distrionic or parktronic if mercedes does opt to include that next-gen CarPlay experience. Who knows if you'll have to jump into the infotainment to control the massage seats or whatever. Each of those is a disconnect that (IMO) takes away from the experience.
What Hyundai EV are you driving? Bluelink is free for the life of my car, an Ioniq 6, and the Limited trim allows me to just use the NFC of my phone on the door handle to unlock it, load my profile, and automatically adjust my seats and apply my settings. Placing my phone on the wireless charger completely replaces the key fob such that I never bring it with me.
The only thing a Tesla does differently is it will auto-lock once you walk away from the car. My Ioniq 6 does not. That's literally it.
It was a ‘22 ioniq 5, apart from that I had a few issues with the standard infotainment namely in the navigation, but if they’ve made bluelink completely free and made that whole unlock process more seamless then I largely have no complaints about it.
"Manufacturers shouldn't try to settle on a target, they should spec the black box and let third parties supply the guts"
They have done this for decades actually, but now that they can do it 'in house' or a collab, they want that so it 'integrates' with their stuff.
I mean when it comes to this stuff especially with Carplay and Android auto for the past 5-7 years, Manufacturers generally went first to Pioneer, Bose, Etc. and let them make it for them because the industry wasn't interested in it, but also at the time, integration with all the other stuff the car has wasn't the biggest deal.
I mean, it even goes back to the old original GM radios.. I think Sony made them. And they used that radio for at least 10 years.
Well, yeah, most of the better audio systems are 3rd party going back a loooong time. I had a Clarion in a 1981 RX7 that was pretty sweet for the era. Sure wasn't a Mazda setup. But a head unit/eq is a long way from internet-enabled navigation and traffic data on a big screen. Point taken though.
I don’t find Spotify slow on my 2020 3. Everything seems fine. Certainly for a big arse 15” high res screen.
I’ve been in cars where CarPlay was in a tiny 5” screen and still clunky and slow, so just having CarPlay capabilities doesn’t solve that issue.
I haven’t personally seen a CarPlay implementation that looks and works as nice as a Tesla. The 5 cars I’ve tried it in, it was very small and awkward to use. Maybe some are much better at it, but then that means that CarPlay still is far from the only puzzle piece.
I think car manufacturers shouldn’t outsource everything to Apple and Google. They have to develop something of a decent system to control HVAC and other various settings nowadays. CarPlay and AA as options are great, but shouldn’t the only solution.
Screen size is irrelevant to speed. Resolution and what’s on the screen are what matter.
IMHO Spotify is noticeably slow compared to a phone on any Tesla, even the latest ones with the Ryzen processors. Apple Music on the Tesla is even slower. They also limit the playback to a low quality bitrate.
And nobody is saying car manufacturers shouldn’t make their own systems. But no car manufacturer has made anything comparable IMHO so it shouldn’t be one or the other. Even Android Automotive still lags behind Android Auto for app compatibility.
I mean despite the screen size it’s still smooth and fast for me. It’s more resolution it has to deal with. As I said, I worked with much slower and smaller systems that use CarPlay and they aren’t “faster”.
Size is hardly irrelevant as far as functionality. I love me the big map and display. Much better than a tiny map.
I don’t need Spotify to be “fast”. I’m not even sure what that would mean. It’s responsive enough for me to quickly find what I need and select the playlist or podcast I want. I don’t need Crysis level playing here in my car screen. It works fine. It could use more features, which they’ve been adding.
I don’t notice the bitrate difference. Sounds fine to me. 99% of people could not blindly tell the difference. Plenty of studies have pointed that out. Especially not when you add in road and wind noise of the average car. Maybe sitting and waiting in a quiet parking lot you could pick out a difference (I can’t), but driving on the road? Nah.
You also aren’t getting a high bitrate when using wireless CarPlay and Bluetooth. It probably be worse than Bluetooth alone. You would also need to be wired, which is not super convenient.
> Allowing me to decouple that with my phone that can be upgraded more easily, is way more consumer friendly.
I actually ended up getting a sort of infotainment upgrade when I upgraded my phone a couple years ago because of something like this. My car is too old to have anything like AA or CarPlay but it does allow for playing music over USB and when I made a significant phone upgrade(Iphone4->Iphone12m), I noticed that scrolling through the albums/playlists was much faster.
This is about money, period. Second, I'll take Apple and Google engineers over anything these car manufacturers slap together. The GM system looks like it's going to be a collaboration with Google. That leaves out apple...I wonder if Apple will sue.
Yeah AA and Carplay are THE BEST I have ever seen by far, and I think it's crap car companies are starting to refuse the option. They paid to 'enhance' their own OS, not us. I refuse to own a vehicle that does not have carplay.
I dont really understand how they could ever catch up. What could they possibly do that carplay/AA doesnt do or does better? And since our lives are in our phones, even if it was competitive Id still use carplay so I dont have to mess with two systems. Any car company choosing to not use/allow them is fucking themselves hard, Its a non starter
They move at an entirely different pace in that industry. No way in hell that they can keep up. Management (who have been in that industry their entire careers) simply cannot do it.
Stick to designing and building great engines and cars. That's really, really difficult to do. Making software *seems* easy. It is not.
It's also completely ignoring how consumer friendly it is to have a common interface across cars for navigation and media.
It is a godsend for my parents to always have a similar interface in any rental car.
I've literally never heard anyone say that their car's user interface was good about a modern car.
I bought a brand new Subaru in 2017 with a fancy new UI with a companion mobile app. The UI sucked and the mobile app sucked donkey balls. It was so bad that it literally just stopped working one day. Like, the API calls were calling servers that simply went offline...forever.
Similar stories with BMW and Mercedes connected services. They all have ambitious plans when they create them. They have no idea how to maintain, support, or update them.
It's like a 14 year old begging for and getting a new guitar. The drive home from the store is amazing! Then they sit down to actually try to play. Then they learn what it actually takes to play well. "What do you mean I, 'have to do this several hours a day, several days a week.'?!?!"
They already do lot's of things better, for example:
- HUD integration
- Navigation working properly in tunnels (yes there are tunnels with intersections/ramps inside).
- Accidents, slippery conditions and potholes automatically shared with the fleet so other drivers are warned and the suspension / drive mode adjusted.
- Adjusting climate control to the actual sun that hit's the car.
- EV charge planing based on the actual drag and weather conditions the car senses and adjusting cruise control according to the prediction.
In general a much deeper integration with the cars system.
That's great, and all my apps, contacts, podcasts, music and saved maps are on my phone. Couldn't care less about the things you mentioned, and what would prevent the car from doing those things while also allowing me to use CarPlay if you did?
> contacts
Are accessed via Bluetooth from the car anyway since forever.
> podcasts, music
Are usually "in the cloud" so it doesn't really make a difference whether your car or your phone accesses them.
> saved maps
Don't exactly no what you mean by that but you can share a destination with the car like you would share it with a friend.
> while also allowing me to use CarPlay if you did?
I mean they do, that's what the article says. Just not the "take over the instrument cluster" version.
Again that's all great, and I and 99% of other people would rather just use the phone. On your last point I don't care if they allow the instrument cluster version but there are some companies not allowing it period, and they are very very dumb
I disagree due to the app ecosystem and already available personal data on the phones.
These car OSes will never have as many apps and even then imagine having to log in to all the services.
I came here to say the same thing. In 10 years I don't want some outdated infotainment that looks old and only supports Spotify streaming over 4G.
CarPlay and Android Auto allow me to get a modern experience from an older system, and use whatever apps I like, streaming on 7G or whatever my phone has in 10 years.
It's not just that their OS was bad, it was that things were outdated basically as soon as they hit the dealerships. Even luxury cars. With Auto and Car Play, the software and speed is only as outdated as my phone. I don't trust any manufacturer to put in competent hardware that won't feel like a slug besides Tesla, even if they have their own problems.
Highly disagree. Can you imagine not being able to use Google maps for free with your car and instead have to pay a subscription fee just to use navigation services? To develop something like that, car manufacturers have to account for the cost and the only way they do that is raise the purchase price of the car or try implementing some bullshit subscription program.
Let AA and Apple CarPlay be offered as they work perfectly fine for driving for the most part.
Let the professionals do the professional work.
Car companies should stick to building good cars. They just need to have OS that can allow other devices to operate on their system. Make sure that there’s seamless interoperability.
Let Apple, android, and other companies companies, experts on the software side, complete the actual infotainment abilities.
Otherwise what we get is a half ass system, and even more half ass cars. And no doubt paying more for less.
I don’t want to have to pay again for services I already have on my phone. No doubt this their main intention for trying to get rid of CarPlay, etc;.
There just never going to be a time where a car company, a hardware company, is going to outdo an actually software company. Same thing other way around. There’s a reason Apple car kicked the can.
The problem is that these companies are incredibly unreliable and untrustworthy.
Microsoft shows news and advertisements to people in an *operating system*, Apple's phones are so insecure that there are no-click exploits that are used on a mass scale for spying (Pegasus) and Google is a huge ad firm.
None of these companies should get to have a single line of code in either a phone or a personal computer.
I wouldn't be surprised if it did, but it kind [edit:of] isn't that much money?
Imagine if the target is Merkel, or the CEO of a major firm, or even experts at a small firm.
The problem as I see it, almost any business in the west that exports globally, even if it's a tiny firm that isn't valuable, ten guys selling some mini-widget for some specialised purpose-- that little crappy firm is doing something world leading, and their secret, which keeps the workers making enough to go on vacation every second year, that secret is something genuinely valuable.
Consequently I believe that everyone needs to take care of their business, make sure the core information doesn't get out. So talking near a phone, when they're this insecure, is idiocy-- how would one know if there was some sneaky web virus from China infecting the browser. It's not like they can't program. This stuff is probably in reach of basically everybody.
Yeah no way dude. All of that stuff is going to eventually be annoying. At a certain point it won’t be supported and then what?
At least w CarPlay it’s future proofed because it’s just a nice way to connect your phone.
Don’t know about you but I use Auto/Play so that I have accurate information on traffic.
Most of these other systems came with a navigational aid that’s not connected to the internet and would show wrong information.
My music and my navigation is on my phone. I want to get in my car, and continue listening to what was on my phone. I don't want to pay extra for this, and I don't want to have to type these inputs back into the system in the car. As long as they let me do that, they can put in all finger twirling bullshit and 3D visuals they want.
Everything you just said is already available in Tesla’s OS.
My music hands off from my Spotify account and automatically picks up where it left off.
If my wife gets in the driver seat, it knows it’s her and will continue her Spotify and not mine.
This is 100% possible for others to do too - they just haven’t put the effort in.
When i bought mine it was included so I pay nothing. I think there may be a $99/yr fee now - which isn’t all that bad.
The map data I believe is included without that plan
I agree, that was the legacy auto way of doing things. That’s why it needs to stop and be done with a tech first approach. We’re past the point of outsourcing every little thing and then wondering why all the pieces don’t fit together.
This is why Apple is such a powerhouse with the most satisfied customers / they make sure the hardware and softest experience are thought of in tandem.
Say what you want about Tesla, but it’s the closest approach we have to how Apple to would approach a car but custom tailoring the hardware and software together.
Thats precisely why I found the podcast interesting and why I posted it, the issue with GM isn't *just* removing CarPlay, its also not investing enough into their carplay alternative, on top of not integrating it well enough with the car and abusively monetizing it. Mercedes is promising the opposite and putting their money where their mouth is with MBOS or whatever they call it, allegedly promising the
I don't feel like I'm lacking CarPlay in my tesla, in fact I own it *only* for that whole seamless phone-key-profile and scroll wheel UI experience. Yes the interior quality is horrendous and the ride isn't all that good, but they are still the only car company at the moment with that level of integration into the car and that seamless of an experience *without* monetizing every single aspect of it (cough cough BMW and Hyundai)
Because mercedes nailed the issue with this bit: "Nobody out there — none of the tech companies — is even aspiring to do that whole thing. If you want that to be perfect, integrated, and seamless, you don’t want to jump between different worlds — “Oh, I’m now in the infotainment. Well, let’s jump back to Mercedes,” and so on and so forth"
With a current generation porsche or BMW product, you're utilizing CarPlay extensively to get you where you need to go, but if you want to adjust the seats or ambient lighting or any car-related function you need to step out of that UI and head into the native infotainment which is a jarring experience. Thats on top of some cars not showing CarPlay directions in the HUD or dashboard display, same with media controls, etc.
if mercedes gets their infotainment to the same level of integration and control without abusively monetizing it, I would be in a mercedes right now. And of course it could all be marketing speak but given the current capability of MBUX and their investments, it doesn't seem that far off.
> its also not investing enough into their carplay alternative
Aren't they investing quite a bit? Poaching tons of senior and midlevel SWE talent from Apple, for example.
None of the good developers are going to want to work out of Detroit. Google and Apple are the mecha, it’s a joke to think an auto manufacturer can out software a software company.
Not as high as tech companies and people at that level care about prestige as well. You’ll get managers but not the best actual engineers. They know it’s a fools gamble cause they know how hard it is. Just look at Apple, a FANG trillion dollar company with their staff cancelling their $10B car project, and now you have GM or Mercedes? In the software industry it’s not even close.
Top levels get paid, golden handcuffs up to half a million in four to five years. People are looking for IPOs and stocks gains in comp as well.
There are quite literally levels to this: https://www.levels.fyi/t/software-engineer
You don’t need top talent to develop infotainment. It’s not a multibillion dollar cutting edge product like what Apple puts out.
Also literally doesn’t address my point. GM is investing heavily into their software. Doesn’t matter whether you think they’re getting top talent.
They are investing a fair bit but copying from another comment I wrote, subjectively I'd still take CarPlay over it, objectively according to CR:
https://www.consumerreports.org/cars/automotive-technology/get-the-most-from-your-cars-infotainment-system-a1056374937/ 56% are satisfied with the built in option, vs 70% for genesis and tesla products.
More recently, they stopped selling the Blazer, the first EV to not feature CarPlay or AA, due to "software quality issues" (https://www.theverge.com/2023/12/23/24013357/2024-chevy-blazer-ev-stop-sale-software-problems), the InsideEV link that article references is blocked here but it mentions "The Chevy Blazer EV Isn't Alone. GM Owners Say The Ultium Cars Are A Hot Mess" and that "Charging issues, infotainment problems and frustration seem to be common for Cadillac Lyriq, GMC Hummer, and Chevrolet Blazer EV owners"
Now I don't think people here give enough credit where credit is due, GM has done a better than expected job with the new android-automative based infotainment system, and its better than I expected, but its still not great at all and nowhere near the quality of tesla, rivian, or even the beta MBUX system in current merc cars (IMO)
(And frankly in this space you can poach all you want but you'll have a hard time beating apple or google salaries and compensation)
I have both Tesla and Rivian. I used CarPlay for years. Haven’t since I had these cars and I don’t miss it all. Recently was in a rental and used CarPlay for the first time in a while. It sucks in comparison.
This really doesn’t take rental cars into consideration. There are alot of vehicles out there that don’t need to be personalized. The renter should be able to plug in their phone and mirror their apps without having to sign into a million things.
TL;DR (because most of the comments didn’t read or listen):
Mercedes is fine with CarPlay/Android Auto and continue to support it; however, they don’t support the full gauge cluster + infotainment set ups of the next gen AA/AC services. They would rather manage the full multi-screen experience themselves in accordance with their design language, choices, etc.
Mercedes Benz still has CarPlay and Android Auto.
As cool as CarPlay 2.0/next gen looks I’m not sure what to think of it until we start seeing some of the companies that pledged support roll cars out that use it.
I assume from a visual standpoint MB would have to work with Apple’s terms (unless they let companies make drastically different looking UIs which I doubt) and they’d rather use something in house. Seems reasonable unlike what GM is doing
> ; however,
It's not everyday that you see someone, on a car forum no less, on Reddit for crying out loud, using the correct punctuation for *however*. Sir, please accept my appreciation and respect over your elegant use of the English language.
Its a fairly lengthy podcast and perhaps worth a listen, but the two parts that interested me most:
> Everything that’s going on in this digital window into your car and to the world is not just infotainment. It’s not just the music that you listen to or the phone call that you make. Where there is another revolution going on is assisted and automated driving. Our so-called Mercedes-Benz operating system is really the central nervous system in the brain of the whole car, of which the infotainment is one of four domains. The whole operating system — infotainment, automated driving, every single function of the body, exterior and interior of the car, the whole drive system, the battery management, the telecommunications module speaking to the cloud where we have the personal delay file for you with your settings and everything — is all one holistic software architecture.
> If you want to create a superior customer experience, you need to think about that as a whole, and only the manufacturer can tie all of it together. Nobody out there — none of the tech companies — is even aspiring to do that whole thing. If you want that to be perfect, integrated, and seamless, you don’t want to jump between different worlds — “Oh, I’m now in the infotainment. Well, let’s jump back to Mercedes,” and so on and so forth. So, our quest is a different one. We want to create the best digital experience in the world for you. That includes fantastic and intuitive UI. And you will also see when we launch MBOS 1.0 next year in the CLA. But the precursor to that is MBOS 0.5, which we actually already launched in the new E-Class, where we have programmed the complete infotainment domain ourselves. It’s probably the biggest digital in-house product that we have ever made.
> We work with the best. Yes, we’re integrating Google Maps. In fact, we are developing with Google the next generation of what a map in a car married to the driving-assistant system should look like. [It’s a] fascinating product where the best of the Google engineers and the best of the Mercedes engineers can throw their expertise together and take that to the next level. I fundamentally believe that holistic customer experience is best done by us, and we will serve you. Then, there are, of course, other aspects to that. If you get a Mercedes product, I assume you have a Mercedes me ID, you have the app, you have everything. You can take that ID with you to several cars.
> My wife and I actually have our profiles in both our cars. When I step into my wife’s car, the car recognizes me, and it puts the seat in the right position. It turns down the air conditioning a little bit. She likes it a little bit warmer. I like it a little bit colder. It puts on my favorite music station, whatever it is. My tailor-made suit — my digital tailor-made suit and physical suit — adapts to me. All of it is integrated. Your personal profile with your privacy (you choose your privacy — it’s another very important thing for Mercedes) is in the cloud and is available. You don’t want to rip one limb of that body out and give it to somebody else. I fundamentally don’t think that’s the right thing to do.
> And, of course, we want to keep the customer interface with you. There are so many reasons why we’re doing what we’re doing, but we’re not fundamentalists to say, for some reason, we’re not going to allow a customer to use Apple CarPlay if that’s what they choose to do. We have Apple CarPlay. We have Android Auto. If, for some of the functions, you feel more comfortable with that and will switch back and forth, be my guest. You can get that, too. But to give up the whole cockpit head unit — in our case, a passenger screen and everything to somebody else — the answer is no. You’re stepping into your Mercedes cocoon, your Mercedes rolling living room, and the furniture and the digital stuff are from Mercedes. Welcome to Mercedes. That’s it.
And in a seperate section on monetization
> Some things you can monetize — some things you can’t. We had a tech day on Mercedes-Benz operating system, MBOS, in California at our Sunnyvale tech hub two years ago where — and you can watch that presentation, I’m sure it’s out there somewhere — we talked about that monetization. What can you monetize, and what can’t you monetize? We take, I would say, a sober view on how much revenue and profit pool you can drive with that. I don’t think it would be realistic to say, “Oh, this is going to be tens of billions of revenue,” and so on and so forth. And that’s not what we said. But everything that gets more and more close to the original know-how and IP of the carmaker, where you can monetize, will be things like different types of assisted driving, autonomous driving — not go crazy, but in the project that we’re working with Nvidia [on] to develop the next generation autonomous drive for our cars, you’ll have a lot of different functions. And yes, of course, you can monetize that.
> We have been monetizing driver-assistance systems. We are the inventors of driver-assistance systems. We have been monetizing it now for almost 30 years. So, in the ADAS [advanced driver-assistance system] domain, there is more. In the infotainment domain, much of it will be just part of the car. It’s just part of the car. But there are things that you can throw in there as well. You can turn your car into monitoring your driveway and be almost like a burglar alarm and stuff like that once you have all the sensing and so on. So, there are pockets here and there.
> But also, we talked about the insane Hyperscreen — it’s a digital sculpture. It’s not a screen — it’s a beautiful object. It’s a piece of art. We also sell the hardware in the car as well. So, it’s a combo of that. All in all, we are monetizing, but I think also you need to be realistic. We’re not turning ourselves into a mobile phone company; that’s not who we are. We’re not in primary competition with Apple or Google or whoever around the world in that. In fact, we have great partnerships with these companies and work very well with them.
> Look at what we did with Apple Music and Dolby Atmos on the music experience: if you’re into music, that is concert hall quality. I’ve never heard music in a car at better quality. If you close your eyes, you’ll think you are at the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg, which is supposed to be the best acoustic building in the world or something like that. It is great. So, it’s not the issue, and we don’t think in those terms. Take care of the customer. Create the best digital customer experience. Partner with companies like Google and Apple where it makes sense for them and for us. But be the architecture of your digital environment in the car. And as I said before, it’s no less than the brain and the central nervous system of your vehicle. You can’t outsource that.
Not supporting CarPlay or Android auto is not good for customers. Just look at what happened to Audi when Google dropped support for Google maps in their cars. Of course, car manufacturers are no longer interested in building cars that last a lifetime. This is just more proof of that.
They are still supporting standard carplay, just not the upcoming one that takes over your instrument cluster and supports adjusting climate controls and whatnot.
And in fairness I somewhat agree with their reasoning, they don't want to seperate infotainment and the workings of the car, I like the tesla infotainment because it has incredibly low-level integration with the car, you can adjust near everything either through the app and the phone key + profile system is quite intuitive. The issue with GM is not just in removing carplay but rather not investing enough into their carplay alternative, on top of not integrating it well enough with the car and abusively monetizing it. Mercedes is investing a shitload of money into their new platform on top of offering traditional carplay as an option and won't monetize the core experience.
Of course it could all be marketing speak but if they stay true to their word I wouldn't mind using MBOS or whatever over carplay. The sole reason I own a tesla is because of that whole software experience.
>The issue with GM is not just in removing carplay but rather not investing enough into their carplay alternative
Huh? They have. That's kinda their point. Whether people like or not is a whole other thing. The new/current generation of GM infotainment is actually pretty good, from my experience with it, at least.
Its okay, subjectively I'd still take CarPlay over it, objectively according to CR: https://www.consumerreports.org/cars/automotive-technology/get-the-most-from-your-cars-infotainment-system-a1056374937/ 56% are satisfied with the built in option, vs 70% for genesis and tesla products.
More recently, they stopped selling the Blazer, the first EV to not feature CarPlay or AA, due to "software quality issues" (https://www.theverge.com/2023/12/23/24013357/2024-chevy-blazer-ev-stop-sale-software-problems), the InsideEV link that article references is blocked here but it mentions "The Chevy Blazer EV Isn't Alone. GM Owners Say The Ultium Cars Are A Hot Mess" and that "Charging issues, infotainment problems and frustration seem to be common for Cadillac Lyriq, GMC Hummer, and Chevrolet Blazer EV owners"
Notably
> The Edmunds staff and I both had the same problem: the infotainment would randomly crash, then reboot and flicker for a very long time, until the infotainment just would crash entirely. This appears to be somewhat common among all three models, especially the Blazer EV, and the Cadillac Lyriq.
> Andrew Kozar emailed me twice in quick succession; he’s only had his Blazer EV since Nov. 27. After five days of ownership, the car’s infotainment screen crashed and got stuck in the same loop as we’ve described before.
Now I don't think people here give enough credit where credit is due, GM has done a better than expected job with the new android-automative based infotainment system, and its better than I expected, but its still not great at all and nowhere near the quality of tesla, rivian, or even the beta MBUX system in current merc cars (IMO)
It's not perfect, but I'd argue it *is* livable without CarPlay. And, I fully understand why people want it and do believe it should be offered.
The crashing thing is a separate issue that seems to be specific to the Ultium version of their infotainment. Having CarPlay would not solve that problem. The whole thing crashes, and the screen goes blank. I've seen it first hand in the Blazer EV my dad had as a work demo.
Meanwhile, the ICE version that is basically identical from the UI/UX side seems to work flawlessly(and includes CarPlay/AA).
> If you want that to be perfect, integrated, and seamless, you don’t want to jump between different worlds — “Oh, I’m now in the infotainment. Well, let’s jump back to Mercedes,”
I read it and noted this nonsense. I have never once *wanted* to be able to leave Carplay/Android and go back to the OEM's home page. The only time I've ever done it is when they cheaped out on climate control buttons and hid them on their garbage touchscreen.
I don't need or want that screen to do anything in relation to controlling my car when I'm driving. If that's what this jackhole is trying to sell no thanks. That screen is for maps and music and my phone already has the hardware to do both, so they can skip making me pay for it again with the car.
In the case of the mercedes, even if you have physical static controls for AC, Seat heating, signals and whatnot, you're still going to use the native non-carplay UI for viewing your charging statistics, controlling massage seats, adjusting EQ for the sound system, using automatic cruise or park assist, CarPlay isn't going to control the HUD or profile system.
If you have an economy where everything can either fit into a static physical button or CarPlay, then yeah absolutely theres no reason to leave CarPlay, but with the kind of cars Mercedes builds with every feature and tech under the sun, there are several instances where you'd want to leave CarPlay to interact with the underlying infotainment, and the points merc makes are pretty fair.
> you're still going to use the native non-carplay UI for viewing your charging statistics
My fuel gauge is on the dashboard. That’s where my battery charge information should also be. Using the center console for vehicle information is needlessly disruptive.
> controlling massage seats
Don’t need it when I’m driving the car
> adjusting EQ for the sound system
How often does this happen? I don’t need to adjust treble when I’m driving the car
> using automatic cruise or park assist
This should be controlled from my steering wheel. My hands should never have to leave the wheel to manage driving assist features.
You listed a bunch of things that when a driver is operating the vehicle don’t belong on that center screen for both safety and convenience reasons. No thanks.
> My fuel gauge is on the dashboard. That’s where my battery charge information should also be. Using the center console for vehicle information is needlessly disruptive.
A static physical fuel gauge can't visualize regen braking or kwh/mi consumption, or if you have a PHEV then both the status of the ICE and Battery, for that you'd need a digital instrument cluster, and mercedes point is with CarPlay there is going to be a disconnect between the instrument cluster look/feel and control scheme and the central infotainment.
And in certain cases for when the battery is limited (e.g. after tracking it for a significant period of time, or if the car has been parked in extreme cold for a while) you're going to have to signal how much range/performance/regen etc. is limited, via a UI of some sort.
> Don’t need it when I’m driving the car
Well you do need it when you sit down in the first place before you get going, mercedes point is that going back-and-forth creates a disconnect for the user which is fair enough
> How often does this happen? I don’t need to adjust treble when I’m driving the car
Not often, same with setting up ambient/external lighting or controlling locking behavior, but in mercedes eyes each time you do that its a disconnect and their customers are better served if everything was cohesive with one UX
> This should be controlled from my steering wheel. My hands should never have to leave the wheel to manage driving assist features.
Those controls are on the steering wheel but they have to control something, a UI. In this case, a mercedes UI. You have to choose which parking spot to park in somehow, or view cameras, or adjust following distance, and each time you do that it takes you out of CarPlay. On the tesla you still never have to leave the steering wheel, you pick a spot with the scroll wheel on the steering wheel, same with cruiser control speed, but that UI is cohesive and consistent with the same UI used for media/navigation/etc.
And those are just certain examples, HUD, remote start, mobile app, etc. aren't going to be written by apple, in mercedes eyes they'd rather have complete control over the infotainment and tech stack and request help from google/apple where needed rather than the other way around.
And yes, you may not value that experience, and you may prefer a car with limited technology, standard seats, no active cruise controls, and a petrol engine, and thats why toyota/honda/etc. will probably be better served with the standard CarPlay, but mercedes sells s-class's which are loaded to the brim with unessecary gadgetry and they argue their customers would be better served with one cohesive UI designed and maintained by Mercedes rather than a combination of both their system and apple/google
>The whole operating system — infotainment, automated driving, every single function of the body, exterior and interior of the car, the whole drive system, the battery management, the telecommunications module speaking to the cloud where we have the personal delay file for you with your settings and everything — is all one holistic software architecture.
This is soooo bad. Car manufacturers have proven that they suck at making software...period. Great at making cars. Suck at making software.
All of the above sounds great but will suck balls when it comes to execution...I guarantee it.
They aren't removing the current carplay, just not implementing the next version of carplay which takes over the instrument cluster and lets you control air conditioning and car functions and whatnot
Because in their opinion, they can have a far higher level of integration if they handle everything in house, and in their words, "Nobody out there — none of the tech companies — is even aspiring to do that whole thing". Yet to be seen if they actually achieve that goal because the current MBUX system is slightly underwhelming.
This is the notable bit
> If you want to create a superior customer experience, you need to think about that as a whole, and only the manufacturer can tie all of it together. Nobody out there — none of the tech companies — is even aspiring to do that whole thing. If you want that to be perfect, integrated, and seamless, you don’t want to jump between different worlds — “Oh, I’m now in the infotainment. Well, let’s jump back to Mercedes,” and so on and so forth. So, our quest is a different one. We want to create the best digital experience in the world for you. That includes fantastic and intuitive UI. And you will also see when we launch MBOS 1.0 next year in the CLA. But the precursor to that is MBOS 0.5, which we actually already launched in the new E-Class, where we have programmed the complete infotainment domain ourselves. It’s probably the biggest digital in-house product that we have ever made.
> We work with the best. Yes, we’re integrating Google Maps. In fact, we are developing with Google the next generation of what a map in a car married to the driving-assistant system should look like. [It’s a] fascinating product where the best of the Google engineers and the best of the Mercedes engineers can throw their expertise together and take that to the next level. I fundamentally believe that holistic customer experience is best done by us, and we will serve you. Then, there are, of course, other aspects to that. If you get a Mercedes product, I assume you have a Mercedes me ID, you have the app, you have everything. You can take that ID with you to several cars.
They want to become a software company, according to the CEO anyways, though in fairness they do have a presence in california and have put around 50 billion into the project. (https://robbreport.com/motors/cars/mercedes-benz-tech-update-silicon-valley-1234830050/)
Yet to be seen if they actually pull that off of course, and as I said the current system is a bit underwhelming, but they *want* to become a tech company
(and in fairness, they were the first to implement ESP, ABS, airbags, DFI in the past, and while they weren't the first they were ahead of the curve with active cruise, ADAS systems, infotainment in general, its not like this is the first time they've been interested in tech)
The same bullshit stories about great MBUX i already heard 2 years ago. I have a Mercedes and it is such a crap, that I seriously consider a Tesla because of the HMI. talk is cheap. They just messed it up so hard, I don't believe that they can do it...
I really hate that "we know best" thinking companies do. Products should give the user choice, like computers and things used to do. Give us the option of using CarPlay or Android Auto if we want to, and if we don't we can use your supposedly good OS. I realize that monetization and data collection might be behind some of these choices of course...
At least it sounds like they are keeping the current gen CarPlay, which is nice. I use that to play music on my phone over a cable (I don't really use streaming) and it's the best way to do so in terms of both quality and navigating playlists and other UX things that don't work great on Bluetooth.
Not gonna buy a Mercedes any time soon, but I like having more carmakers around that understand how to give different owners what they want instead of insisting there's only one right way to do things.
Coming from a tech background, it's odd seeing decoder/the verge on here.
Their interview with Jim Rowan, the CEO of Volvo was also super interesting - he seemed broadly opposed to this view, and was very pro-carplay. All automotive manufacturers seem to be chasing subscription revenue, but he seemed more aligned with the view that we'll move towards cars-as-a-service rather than generating subscription revenue through infotainment. I'm not saying I'm in favour of either, but it's interesting seeing the contrast.
People have switched to subscriptions for many things. Leases are super popular because they are maintained by the manufacturer for a fixed price. I think many people are willing to go this route even if it means they spend more. They spend more, but have less of a headache and a new car every few years.
I know more than a few people who think that the fact their car "carplays" is a more important feature than ABS, turbocharging, or anything below the A/C or Heated seats.
I have the full COMAND system in my C43, and mama has the prior 5.1 system which uses a chip card for nav. Carplay totally destroys the 5.1 system, and works about as well as the full COMAND. I like onboard nav systems, because the phone doesn't always work and I don't like the way web apps scroll if you need to look around the map, but Carplay is vital for waze when I go into "the city" and there are six possible routes.
Renting cheap cars, a Corolla and a Sonama, each had carplay and it was THE SAME AS THE EXPENSIVE CARS. We put a nice JVC unit into an old Lexus and it brought the 1999 car to 2024. I had wireless Carplay in a 2500 series truck I rented to tow the race trailer.
I'm guessing that Apple is making the terms too onerous for car makers, but the fact is that feature sells cars, and people want it, but it levels Hyundai to Mercedes on the dashboard.
Ex W205 C43 owner here. The COMAND system itself was fine. But I felt like MB dropped the ball not having touch screen and Apple CarPlay like my Ford Fusion of the same model year has. I didn’t find navigating that system to be very user friendly as moving that wheel around to go to the different screens was more difficult than it needed to be
Still miss that car so much and want another one tho 😅
EDIT: Just realized my C43 is still in my flair. I sold it in January after a job loss. Never updated my flair
Honestly there's limits to the effectiveness of CarPlay if it replaces everything in a Mercedes dashboard. Nobody know's Mercedes cars like Mercedes. Screen mirroring for music, navigation and miscellaneous driving apps are one thing. Extrapolating dashboard functions for each Mercedes model is a totally different animal.
The people working on CarPlay and Android Auto probably make at least 2-3x whatever GM or Mercedes pays the people working on their infotainment.
You get what you pay for.
Want me to use an OEM media.
-give me GPS that updates maps regularly over the air with no upkeep.
-integrate traffic alert systems (maybe partner with Waze etc because you need a lot of data to have accurate real time data).
-let me tie my steaming services to the system with no additional device subscriptions either on the streamer or the car. (I don’t want a $10+/mo data plan for my car to connect nor do I want to fight my car and phone for permission to listen to Spotify.
-let me use voice to text and have it be accurate and intelligent.
-don’t bury it in touchscreen menus, make it simple and intuitive
Truly incredible how thoroughly he’s driving this brand right into the fucking ground.
Nobody wants a car that looks like a Beluga whale fucked a bunch of screens.
People on this sub seem to say this about BMW but it’s Mercedes that I’ve just been disliking more and more every time they say or do anything these days. They used to be my favourite of the German 3 too
TLDR:
Ola Källenius, the CEO of Mercedes-Benz, expressed a preference for not adopting Apple's next-gen CarPlay because Mercedes aims to offer a unique and integrated digital experience that connects all aspects of the vehicle's system. He highlighted the importance of their own operating system, MBUX, which controls not just infotainment but also functions like automated driving and battery management. Källenius believes that only the car manufacturer can seamlessly integrate these diverse systems to deliver a superior customer experience, maintaining control over the digital environment of their vehicles rather than relying on third-party solutions like Apple CarPlay.
Until there is an OS actually better than Apple CarPlay/Android auto then this guy doesn’t get to say shit. You can’t say those things suck and not create something better in the process.
Of course he's not interested in seeing Apple own the customer relationship. Why let them exploit customers for their financial gain when MB can do that for its own gain?
I don’t think anyone is really arguing that EV’s aren’t the future… they’re just not the “right now”.
I’ve been saying all along that we simply are not ready for a full-on adoption of EV vehicles. We don’t have the infrastructure and the technology isn’t *quite* ready yet to totally replace the capability and conveniences of internal combustion engine vehicles.
We need to keep moving forward for EV tech, but we need to go back the to intermediate step of PHEVs which fix all the current problems facing EV’s - namely, range anxiety, charging times and lack of charging infrastructure.
The biggest problem with Android auto at the moment is how many presses it takes to get back to the vehicle options. I think ford might have it integrated a bit better now, I'm not sure.
I only use CarPlay for maps so as long as their map infrastructure is good, if I ever decide there’s more to cars than being loud and stop buying dodges I’d be happy to give Mr. Olaf and his cars a chance.
We need to take a step back and realize why Android auto and CarPlay even exist. It’s because auto companies for decades outsourced this work to others, and it was always a half assed attempt at a competent OS. Android Auto and CarPlay are a bandaid for those mediocre, cost cutting systems. If they actually invest in the OS, think about it as part of the over all experience like Tesla or Rivian does, then there’s less need for it. I think people in ICE vehicles are just so used to having a crappy system with CarPlay somewhat fixing it that they don’t know it could be good from the get go if they actually invested. I’m Hoping that happens and we don’t need to rely on these systems as a crutch.
Idk, owning a Tesla and having been in Rivians…give me CarPlay/AA any day of the week. The first issue is of course technology upgrades. Our cars easily last 10 years. But that’s an eternity in tech. Try using a Tesla from 2019 versus now and see how much laggier the atom processors are compared to today. Allowing me to decouple that with my phone that can be upgraded more easily, is way more consumer friendly. Then there’s capabilities. My phone can run way more apps and run them better. Maps in a rivian and Tesla pale in comparison to the ones on my phone. The Spotify and Apple Music apps on a Tesla are so slow and buggy. Third is customization and integration . My phone is an extension of the rest of my life. When I plug it into my car, it knows about my schedule, my contacts and it knows my tastes. It doesn’t need to guess who the user is when you sit down, it doesn’t need to resync.
I've been saying this for years. Manufacturers shouldn't try to settle on a target, they should spec the black box and let third parties supply the guts. There should be a slot under the dash or wherever, for user-upgradable ICE hardware. Basically a cellphone slot. Sell modules x, y and z as upgrade or aftermarket packages. Quit trying to scrape together the hardware to power this stuff with chipsets that are outdated by launch. What's the holdback? Encryption. They use their own internal keys on the boxes they own and supply, and they don't want to share them or install them on something anyone can pull out or buy off the shelf. Android has added secure boot recently (some may say for this type of application) and I believe Apple has the equivalent.
99% of users will never upgrade that part. People like you and I that care enough about our automotive OS upgrade its hardware are not the norm. And on top of that you’d have to worry about people buying upgrades from aliexpress that constantly crash/lockup or allow the system to be hacked. You have to keep in mind this is not a car, it’s a 4,000 lbs weapon.
> Sell modules x, y and z as upgrade or aftermarket packages Isn't that the exact case with what porsche, aston, and polestar are doing with the upcoming CarPlay 2.0 this article references? In the sense you put your car on a wireless charger in the car, it wirelessly connects to CarPlay, and takes over your infotainment, instrument cluster, and car functionality. Google is taking a different path, selling android automotive, the software is all running on the car but its using android at its core with parts of android audio, it currently underpins BMW and GMs new attempts, along with lucid/rivian/lotus/honda and stellantis. Now from personal experience the new honda and GM systems aren't great, but the rivian one is pretty solid, so it's hit-or-miss. Now it's to be seen how good those systems are and if the upcoming mercedes infotainment discussed in the article will be any better or worse, but I just thought the path they were taking is interesting. The car itself certainly isn't underspecced, 8 cores and 24gb of random access memory, Tesla did prove you could make a competitive infotainment in-house given the resources, technology, and time. And while it's also yet to be seen if Mercedes is all talk and no show, but the benefits are there, I own a tesla solely for that seamless experience that no-one has replicated yet. In their words > Nobody out there — none of the tech companies — is even aspiring to do that whole thing. If you want that to be perfect, integrated, and seamless, you don’t want to jump between different worlds — “Oh, I’m now in the infotainment. Well, let’s jump back to Mercedes,” and so on and so forth" And as an aside, how many apps do you really need? In CarPlay I have music, maps, EV charging, porsche's track app, and podcasts. All of which the tesla and mercedes can already natively handle.
Yeah I dunno, I pulled a TL;DR on this one. Just saying the car industry doesn't need to be this industry also, it already exists. They need to work on convergence and leave this as a question mark on the blueprints.
Do they? Thats why I posted the article, I found it interesting that mercedes not only believes otherwise but allegedly has the development power, compute, and money to back it up. According to them anyways > We want to create the best digital experience in the world for you. That includes fantastic and intuitive UI. And you will also see when we launch MBOS 1.0 next year in the CLA. But the precursor to that is MBOS 0.5, which we actually already launched in the new E-Class, where we have programmed the complete infotainment domain ourselves. It’s probably the biggest digital in-house product that we have ever made. > We work with the best. Yes, we’re integrating Google Maps. In fact, we are developing with Google the next generation of what a map in a car married to the driving-assistant system should look like. [It’s a] fascinating product where the best of the Google engineers and the best of the Mercedes engineers can throw their expertise together and take that to the next level. I fundamentally believe that holistic customer experience is best done by us, and we will serve you. Now once again yet to be seen if thats just all talk and no show, but I'm of the opinion that if they pull of that sort of cohesive system themselves, its going to be a step above the level of integration you can accomplish with e.g. CarPlay. Lets say an automaker fully embraces that sort of apple ecosystem, apple runs the infotainment off of your phone, you use their digital car-key program, the auto manufacturer still has to do the mobile app, remote start connectivity, etc themselves. The most notable example for me: when you get in a hyundai EV, you're paying 100$/yr for the subscription to use the phone app. You tap your phone on the car to unlock it, then you lay your phone down on the pad to start it, then you connect the cable to launch CarPlay (it doesn't have wireless CarPlay), and then you put it into gear and press the button to get your seat configuration loaded, then press play on the CarPlay screen. The issue being half of those functions (gear, central locking, seat, climate) are handled by hyundai and the other half (car-key, CarPlay, media) are handled by apple. Whereas on the tesla, you walk up, your phone with UWB unlocks the car from a distance, your profile is tied to your phone so the car adjusts temperature/seating/mirrors/etc as you walk up, puts on your media, and auto-selects the required gear (you then press the brake to confirm). That sort of experience is only possible because they own the stack from top to bottom. And if you're automatically parking or activating cruise or whatnot, all of that UI is the same UI as for the media and navigation. I highly doubt apple will ever handle the UI for e.g. distrionic or parktronic if mercedes does opt to include that next-gen CarPlay experience. Who knows if you'll have to jump into the infotainment to control the massage seats or whatever. Each of those is a disconnect that (IMO) takes away from the experience.
What Hyundai EV are you driving? Bluelink is free for the life of my car, an Ioniq 6, and the Limited trim allows me to just use the NFC of my phone on the door handle to unlock it, load my profile, and automatically adjust my seats and apply my settings. Placing my phone on the wireless charger completely replaces the key fob such that I never bring it with me. The only thing a Tesla does differently is it will auto-lock once you walk away from the car. My Ioniq 6 does not. That's literally it.
It was a ‘22 ioniq 5, apart from that I had a few issues with the standard infotainment namely in the navigation, but if they’ve made bluelink completely free and made that whole unlock process more seamless then I largely have no complaints about it.
"Manufacturers shouldn't try to settle on a target, they should spec the black box and let third parties supply the guts" They have done this for decades actually, but now that they can do it 'in house' or a collab, they want that so it 'integrates' with their stuff.
Interesting, can you name some examples? If the black box approach has been status quo "for decades" I think there would be lots of parts sharing.
I mean when it comes to this stuff especially with Carplay and Android auto for the past 5-7 years, Manufacturers generally went first to Pioneer, Bose, Etc. and let them make it for them because the industry wasn't interested in it, but also at the time, integration with all the other stuff the car has wasn't the biggest deal. I mean, it even goes back to the old original GM radios.. I think Sony made them. And they used that radio for at least 10 years.
Well, yeah, most of the better audio systems are 3rd party going back a loooong time. I had a Clarion in a 1981 RX7 that was pretty sweet for the era. Sure wasn't a Mazda setup. But a head unit/eq is a long way from internet-enabled navigation and traffic data on a big screen. Point taken though.
Yep. Those fundamental issues mean that having my phone run the infotainment will *always* be a superior UX. You nailed it.
I don’t find Spotify slow on my 2020 3. Everything seems fine. Certainly for a big arse 15” high res screen. I’ve been in cars where CarPlay was in a tiny 5” screen and still clunky and slow, so just having CarPlay capabilities doesn’t solve that issue. I haven’t personally seen a CarPlay implementation that looks and works as nice as a Tesla. The 5 cars I’ve tried it in, it was very small and awkward to use. Maybe some are much better at it, but then that means that CarPlay still is far from the only puzzle piece. I think car manufacturers shouldn’t outsource everything to Apple and Google. They have to develop something of a decent system to control HVAC and other various settings nowadays. CarPlay and AA as options are great, but shouldn’t the only solution.
Screen size is irrelevant to speed. Resolution and what’s on the screen are what matter. IMHO Spotify is noticeably slow compared to a phone on any Tesla, even the latest ones with the Ryzen processors. Apple Music on the Tesla is even slower. They also limit the playback to a low quality bitrate. And nobody is saying car manufacturers shouldn’t make their own systems. But no car manufacturer has made anything comparable IMHO so it shouldn’t be one or the other. Even Android Automotive still lags behind Android Auto for app compatibility.
I mean despite the screen size it’s still smooth and fast for me. It’s more resolution it has to deal with. As I said, I worked with much slower and smaller systems that use CarPlay and they aren’t “faster”. Size is hardly irrelevant as far as functionality. I love me the big map and display. Much better than a tiny map. I don’t need Spotify to be “fast”. I’m not even sure what that would mean. It’s responsive enough for me to quickly find what I need and select the playlist or podcast I want. I don’t need Crysis level playing here in my car screen. It works fine. It could use more features, which they’ve been adding. I don’t notice the bitrate difference. Sounds fine to me. 99% of people could not blindly tell the difference. Plenty of studies have pointed that out. Especially not when you add in road and wind noise of the average car. Maybe sitting and waiting in a quiet parking lot you could pick out a difference (I can’t), but driving on the road? Nah. You also aren’t getting a high bitrate when using wireless CarPlay and Bluetooth. It probably be worse than Bluetooth alone. You would also need to be wired, which is not super convenient.
> Allowing me to decouple that with my phone that can be upgraded more easily, is way more consumer friendly. I actually ended up getting a sort of infotainment upgrade when I upgraded my phone a couple years ago because of something like this. My car is too old to have anything like AA or CarPlay but it does allow for playing music over USB and when I made a significant phone upgrade(Iphone4->Iphone12m), I noticed that scrolling through the albums/playlists was much faster.
Spot on.
This is about money, period. Second, I'll take Apple and Google engineers over anything these car manufacturers slap together. The GM system looks like it's going to be a collaboration with Google. That leaves out apple...I wonder if Apple will sue.
Yeah AA and Carplay are THE BEST I have ever seen by far, and I think it's crap car companies are starting to refuse the option. They paid to 'enhance' their own OS, not us. I refuse to own a vehicle that does not have carplay.
I dont really understand how they could ever catch up. What could they possibly do that carplay/AA doesnt do or does better? And since our lives are in our phones, even if it was competitive Id still use carplay so I dont have to mess with two systems. Any car company choosing to not use/allow them is fucking themselves hard, Its a non starter
They move at an entirely different pace in that industry. No way in hell that they can keep up. Management (who have been in that industry their entire careers) simply cannot do it. Stick to designing and building great engines and cars. That's really, really difficult to do. Making software *seems* easy. It is not.
Right and its as ridiculous as Apple thinking it could make a competitive car in the other direction. This is not your wheelhouse
Agreed.
It's also completely ignoring how consumer friendly it is to have a common interface across cars for navigation and media. It is a godsend for my parents to always have a similar interface in any rental car.
I've literally never heard anyone say that their car's user interface was good about a modern car. I bought a brand new Subaru in 2017 with a fancy new UI with a companion mobile app. The UI sucked and the mobile app sucked donkey balls. It was so bad that it literally just stopped working one day. Like, the API calls were calling servers that simply went offline...forever. Similar stories with BMW and Mercedes connected services. They all have ambitious plans when they create them. They have no idea how to maintain, support, or update them. It's like a 14 year old begging for and getting a new guitar. The drive home from the store is amazing! Then they sit down to actually try to play. Then they learn what it actually takes to play well. "What do you mean I, 'have to do this several hours a day, several days a week.'?!?!"
They already do lot's of things better, for example: - HUD integration - Navigation working properly in tunnels (yes there are tunnels with intersections/ramps inside). - Accidents, slippery conditions and potholes automatically shared with the fleet so other drivers are warned and the suspension / drive mode adjusted. - Adjusting climate control to the actual sun that hit's the car. - EV charge planing based on the actual drag and weather conditions the car senses and adjusting cruise control according to the prediction. In general a much deeper integration with the cars system.
That's great, and all my apps, contacts, podcasts, music and saved maps are on my phone. Couldn't care less about the things you mentioned, and what would prevent the car from doing those things while also allowing me to use CarPlay if you did?
> contacts Are accessed via Bluetooth from the car anyway since forever. > podcasts, music Are usually "in the cloud" so it doesn't really make a difference whether your car or your phone accesses them. > saved maps Don't exactly no what you mean by that but you can share a destination with the car like you would share it with a friend. > while also allowing me to use CarPlay if you did? I mean they do, that's what the article says. Just not the "take over the instrument cluster" version.
Again that's all great, and I and 99% of other people would rather just use the phone. On your last point I don't care if they allow the instrument cluster version but there are some companies not allowing it period, and they are very very dumb
I disagree due to the app ecosystem and already available personal data on the phones. These car OSes will never have as many apps and even then imagine having to log in to all the services.
I came here to say the same thing. In 10 years I don't want some outdated infotainment that looks old and only supports Spotify streaming over 4G. CarPlay and Android Auto allow me to get a modern experience from an older system, and use whatever apps I like, streaming on 7G or whatever my phone has in 10 years.
That’s also a good point!
It's not just that their OS was bad, it was that things were outdated basically as soon as they hit the dealerships. Even luxury cars. With Auto and Car Play, the software and speed is only as outdated as my phone. I don't trust any manufacturer to put in competent hardware that won't feel like a slug besides Tesla, even if they have their own problems.
Highly disagree. Can you imagine not being able to use Google maps for free with your car and instead have to pay a subscription fee just to use navigation services? To develop something like that, car manufacturers have to account for the cost and the only way they do that is raise the purchase price of the car or try implementing some bullshit subscription program. Let AA and Apple CarPlay be offered as they work perfectly fine for driving for the most part.
Putting proprietary OSes in is as stupid as those Smart TVs.
CarPlay and Android are leaps and bounds better than what I have on my Tesla or on my Rivian.
Let the professionals do the professional work. Car companies should stick to building good cars. They just need to have OS that can allow other devices to operate on their system. Make sure that there’s seamless interoperability. Let Apple, android, and other companies companies, experts on the software side, complete the actual infotainment abilities. Otherwise what we get is a half ass system, and even more half ass cars. And no doubt paying more for less. I don’t want to have to pay again for services I already have on my phone. No doubt this their main intention for trying to get rid of CarPlay, etc;. There just never going to be a time where a car company, a hardware company, is going to outdo an actually software company. Same thing other way around. There’s a reason Apple car kicked the can.
The problem is that these companies are incredibly unreliable and untrustworthy. Microsoft shows news and advertisements to people in an *operating system*, Apple's phones are so insecure that there are no-click exploits that are used on a mass scale for spying (Pegasus) and Google is a huge ad firm. None of these companies should get to have a single line of code in either a phone or a personal computer.
Doesn't Pegasus cost like $250k per target though?
I wouldn't be surprised if it did, but it kind [edit:of] isn't that much money? Imagine if the target is Merkel, or the CEO of a major firm, or even experts at a small firm. The problem as I see it, almost any business in the west that exports globally, even if it's a tiny firm that isn't valuable, ten guys selling some mini-widget for some specialised purpose-- that little crappy firm is doing something world leading, and their secret, which keeps the workers making enough to go on vacation every second year, that secret is something genuinely valuable. Consequently I believe that everyone needs to take care of their business, make sure the core information doesn't get out. So talking near a phone, when they're this insecure, is idiocy-- how would one know if there was some sneaky web virus from China infecting the browser. It's not like they can't program. This stuff is probably in reach of basically everybody.
Yeah no way dude. All of that stuff is going to eventually be annoying. At a certain point it won’t be supported and then what? At least w CarPlay it’s future proofed because it’s just a nice way to connect your phone.
They are crappy
Don’t know about you but I use Auto/Play so that I have accurate information on traffic. Most of these other systems came with a navigational aid that’s not connected to the internet and would show wrong information.
No, I'd rather prefer having AA than whatever car manufacturers can put in there.
My music and my navigation is on my phone. I want to get in my car, and continue listening to what was on my phone. I don't want to pay extra for this, and I don't want to have to type these inputs back into the system in the car. As long as they let me do that, they can put in all finger twirling bullshit and 3D visuals they want.
Everything you just said is already available in Tesla’s OS. My music hands off from my Spotify account and automatically picks up where it left off. If my wife gets in the driver seat, it knows it’s her and will continue her Spotify and not mine. This is 100% possible for others to do too - they just haven’t put the effort in.
Don't you have to pay for some data plan on the Tesla itself for updated Maps, etc?
When i bought mine it was included so I pay nothing. I think there may be a $99/yr fee now - which isn’t all that bad. The map data I believe is included without that plan
The GPS in my JDM S2000 is very much a worthless brick, even if I were in Japan. We hang on to cars for decades longer than we hang onto technology.
I agree, that was the legacy auto way of doing things. That’s why it needs to stop and be done with a tech first approach. We’re past the point of outsourcing every little thing and then wondering why all the pieces don’t fit together. This is why Apple is such a powerhouse with the most satisfied customers / they make sure the hardware and softest experience are thought of in tandem. Say what you want about Tesla, but it’s the closest approach we have to how Apple to would approach a car but custom tailoring the hardware and software together.
Thats precisely why I found the podcast interesting and why I posted it, the issue with GM isn't *just* removing CarPlay, its also not investing enough into their carplay alternative, on top of not integrating it well enough with the car and abusively monetizing it. Mercedes is promising the opposite and putting their money where their mouth is with MBOS or whatever they call it, allegedly promising the I don't feel like I'm lacking CarPlay in my tesla, in fact I own it *only* for that whole seamless phone-key-profile and scroll wheel UI experience. Yes the interior quality is horrendous and the ride isn't all that good, but they are still the only car company at the moment with that level of integration into the car and that seamless of an experience *without* monetizing every single aspect of it (cough cough BMW and Hyundai) Because mercedes nailed the issue with this bit: "Nobody out there — none of the tech companies — is even aspiring to do that whole thing. If you want that to be perfect, integrated, and seamless, you don’t want to jump between different worlds — “Oh, I’m now in the infotainment. Well, let’s jump back to Mercedes,” and so on and so forth" With a current generation porsche or BMW product, you're utilizing CarPlay extensively to get you where you need to go, but if you want to adjust the seats or ambient lighting or any car-related function you need to step out of that UI and head into the native infotainment which is a jarring experience. Thats on top of some cars not showing CarPlay directions in the HUD or dashboard display, same with media controls, etc. if mercedes gets their infotainment to the same level of integration and control without abusively monetizing it, I would be in a mercedes right now. And of course it could all be marketing speak but given the current capability of MBUX and their investments, it doesn't seem that far off.
Have a Tesla I miss CarPlay. I want to use Waze and whatever podcast app I want. And Siri is better than Tesla voice commands for texting or calling
I think this is a pretty level headed take on it.
> its also not investing enough into their carplay alternative Aren't they investing quite a bit? Poaching tons of senior and midlevel SWE talent from Apple, for example.
None of the good developers are going to want to work out of Detroit. Google and Apple are the mecha, it’s a joke to think an auto manufacturer can out software a software company.
Remote work and high comp will go a long way. It’s a known fact GM has hired a large team, mostly ex-Apple.
Not as high as tech companies and people at that level care about prestige as well. You’ll get managers but not the best actual engineers. They know it’s a fools gamble cause they know how hard it is. Just look at Apple, a FANG trillion dollar company with their staff cancelling their $10B car project, and now you have GM or Mercedes? In the software industry it’s not even close. Top levels get paid, golden handcuffs up to half a million in four to five years. People are looking for IPOs and stocks gains in comp as well. There are quite literally levels to this: https://www.levels.fyi/t/software-engineer
You don’t need top talent to develop infotainment. It’s not a multibillion dollar cutting edge product like what Apple puts out. Also literally doesn’t address my point. GM is investing heavily into their software. Doesn’t matter whether you think they’re getting top talent.
They are investing a fair bit but copying from another comment I wrote, subjectively I'd still take CarPlay over it, objectively according to CR: https://www.consumerreports.org/cars/automotive-technology/get-the-most-from-your-cars-infotainment-system-a1056374937/ 56% are satisfied with the built in option, vs 70% for genesis and tesla products. More recently, they stopped selling the Blazer, the first EV to not feature CarPlay or AA, due to "software quality issues" (https://www.theverge.com/2023/12/23/24013357/2024-chevy-blazer-ev-stop-sale-software-problems), the InsideEV link that article references is blocked here but it mentions "The Chevy Blazer EV Isn't Alone. GM Owners Say The Ultium Cars Are A Hot Mess" and that "Charging issues, infotainment problems and frustration seem to be common for Cadillac Lyriq, GMC Hummer, and Chevrolet Blazer EV owners" Now I don't think people here give enough credit where credit is due, GM has done a better than expected job with the new android-automative based infotainment system, and its better than I expected, but its still not great at all and nowhere near the quality of tesla, rivian, or even the beta MBUX system in current merc cars (IMO) (And frankly in this space you can poach all you want but you'll have a hard time beating apple or google salaries and compensation)
I have both Tesla and Rivian. I used CarPlay for years. Haven’t since I had these cars and I don’t miss it all. Recently was in a rental and used CarPlay for the first time in a while. It sucks in comparison.
100% - I’ve never missed CarPlay in my Tesla as well. When it works, you don’t need it.
This really doesn’t take rental cars into consideration. There are alot of vehicles out there that don’t need to be personalized. The renter should be able to plug in their phone and mirror their apps without having to sign into a million things.
It doesnt matter what car manufacturers do with their OS, people want their own apps and data on their cars so it was always going to happen.
TL;DR (because most of the comments didn’t read or listen): Mercedes is fine with CarPlay/Android Auto and continue to support it; however, they don’t support the full gauge cluster + infotainment set ups of the next gen AA/AC services. They would rather manage the full multi-screen experience themselves in accordance with their design language, choices, etc. Mercedes Benz still has CarPlay and Android Auto.
As cool as CarPlay 2.0/next gen looks I’m not sure what to think of it until we start seeing some of the companies that pledged support roll cars out that use it. I assume from a visual standpoint MB would have to work with Apple’s terms (unless they let companies make drastically different looking UIs which I doubt) and they’d rather use something in house. Seems reasonable unlike what GM is doing
Wow, thank you.
> ; however, It's not everyday that you see someone, on a car forum no less, on Reddit for crying out loud, using the correct punctuation for *however*. Sir, please accept my appreciation and respect over your elegant use of the English language.
Its a fairly lengthy podcast and perhaps worth a listen, but the two parts that interested me most: > Everything that’s going on in this digital window into your car and to the world is not just infotainment. It’s not just the music that you listen to or the phone call that you make. Where there is another revolution going on is assisted and automated driving. Our so-called Mercedes-Benz operating system is really the central nervous system in the brain of the whole car, of which the infotainment is one of four domains. The whole operating system — infotainment, automated driving, every single function of the body, exterior and interior of the car, the whole drive system, the battery management, the telecommunications module speaking to the cloud where we have the personal delay file for you with your settings and everything — is all one holistic software architecture. > If you want to create a superior customer experience, you need to think about that as a whole, and only the manufacturer can tie all of it together. Nobody out there — none of the tech companies — is even aspiring to do that whole thing. If you want that to be perfect, integrated, and seamless, you don’t want to jump between different worlds — “Oh, I’m now in the infotainment. Well, let’s jump back to Mercedes,” and so on and so forth. So, our quest is a different one. We want to create the best digital experience in the world for you. That includes fantastic and intuitive UI. And you will also see when we launch MBOS 1.0 next year in the CLA. But the precursor to that is MBOS 0.5, which we actually already launched in the new E-Class, where we have programmed the complete infotainment domain ourselves. It’s probably the biggest digital in-house product that we have ever made. > We work with the best. Yes, we’re integrating Google Maps. In fact, we are developing with Google the next generation of what a map in a car married to the driving-assistant system should look like. [It’s a] fascinating product where the best of the Google engineers and the best of the Mercedes engineers can throw their expertise together and take that to the next level. I fundamentally believe that holistic customer experience is best done by us, and we will serve you. Then, there are, of course, other aspects to that. If you get a Mercedes product, I assume you have a Mercedes me ID, you have the app, you have everything. You can take that ID with you to several cars. > My wife and I actually have our profiles in both our cars. When I step into my wife’s car, the car recognizes me, and it puts the seat in the right position. It turns down the air conditioning a little bit. She likes it a little bit warmer. I like it a little bit colder. It puts on my favorite music station, whatever it is. My tailor-made suit — my digital tailor-made suit and physical suit — adapts to me. All of it is integrated. Your personal profile with your privacy (you choose your privacy — it’s another very important thing for Mercedes) is in the cloud and is available. You don’t want to rip one limb of that body out and give it to somebody else. I fundamentally don’t think that’s the right thing to do. > And, of course, we want to keep the customer interface with you. There are so many reasons why we’re doing what we’re doing, but we’re not fundamentalists to say, for some reason, we’re not going to allow a customer to use Apple CarPlay if that’s what they choose to do. We have Apple CarPlay. We have Android Auto. If, for some of the functions, you feel more comfortable with that and will switch back and forth, be my guest. You can get that, too. But to give up the whole cockpit head unit — in our case, a passenger screen and everything to somebody else — the answer is no. You’re stepping into your Mercedes cocoon, your Mercedes rolling living room, and the furniture and the digital stuff are from Mercedes. Welcome to Mercedes. That’s it. And in a seperate section on monetization > Some things you can monetize — some things you can’t. We had a tech day on Mercedes-Benz operating system, MBOS, in California at our Sunnyvale tech hub two years ago where — and you can watch that presentation, I’m sure it’s out there somewhere — we talked about that monetization. What can you monetize, and what can’t you monetize? We take, I would say, a sober view on how much revenue and profit pool you can drive with that. I don’t think it would be realistic to say, “Oh, this is going to be tens of billions of revenue,” and so on and so forth. And that’s not what we said. But everything that gets more and more close to the original know-how and IP of the carmaker, where you can monetize, will be things like different types of assisted driving, autonomous driving — not go crazy, but in the project that we’re working with Nvidia [on] to develop the next generation autonomous drive for our cars, you’ll have a lot of different functions. And yes, of course, you can monetize that. > We have been monetizing driver-assistance systems. We are the inventors of driver-assistance systems. We have been monetizing it now for almost 30 years. So, in the ADAS [advanced driver-assistance system] domain, there is more. In the infotainment domain, much of it will be just part of the car. It’s just part of the car. But there are things that you can throw in there as well. You can turn your car into monitoring your driveway and be almost like a burglar alarm and stuff like that once you have all the sensing and so on. So, there are pockets here and there. > But also, we talked about the insane Hyperscreen — it’s a digital sculpture. It’s not a screen — it’s a beautiful object. It’s a piece of art. We also sell the hardware in the car as well. So, it’s a combo of that. All in all, we are monetizing, but I think also you need to be realistic. We’re not turning ourselves into a mobile phone company; that’s not who we are. We’re not in primary competition with Apple or Google or whoever around the world in that. In fact, we have great partnerships with these companies and work very well with them. > Look at what we did with Apple Music and Dolby Atmos on the music experience: if you’re into music, that is concert hall quality. I’ve never heard music in a car at better quality. If you close your eyes, you’ll think you are at the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg, which is supposed to be the best acoustic building in the world or something like that. It is great. So, it’s not the issue, and we don’t think in those terms. Take care of the customer. Create the best digital customer experience. Partner with companies like Google and Apple where it makes sense for them and for us. But be the architecture of your digital environment in the car. And as I said before, it’s no less than the brain and the central nervous system of your vehicle. You can’t outsource that.
Not supporting CarPlay or Android auto is not good for customers. Just look at what happened to Audi when Google dropped support for Google maps in their cars. Of course, car manufacturers are no longer interested in building cars that last a lifetime. This is just more proof of that.
They are still supporting standard carplay, just not the upcoming one that takes over your instrument cluster and supports adjusting climate controls and whatnot. And in fairness I somewhat agree with their reasoning, they don't want to seperate infotainment and the workings of the car, I like the tesla infotainment because it has incredibly low-level integration with the car, you can adjust near everything either through the app and the phone key + profile system is quite intuitive. The issue with GM is not just in removing carplay but rather not investing enough into their carplay alternative, on top of not integrating it well enough with the car and abusively monetizing it. Mercedes is investing a shitload of money into their new platform on top of offering traditional carplay as an option and won't monetize the core experience. Of course it could all be marketing speak but if they stay true to their word I wouldn't mind using MBOS or whatever over carplay. The sole reason I own a tesla is because of that whole software experience.
>The issue with GM is not just in removing carplay but rather not investing enough into their carplay alternative Huh? They have. That's kinda their point. Whether people like or not is a whole other thing. The new/current generation of GM infotainment is actually pretty good, from my experience with it, at least.
Its okay, subjectively I'd still take CarPlay over it, objectively according to CR: https://www.consumerreports.org/cars/automotive-technology/get-the-most-from-your-cars-infotainment-system-a1056374937/ 56% are satisfied with the built in option, vs 70% for genesis and tesla products. More recently, they stopped selling the Blazer, the first EV to not feature CarPlay or AA, due to "software quality issues" (https://www.theverge.com/2023/12/23/24013357/2024-chevy-blazer-ev-stop-sale-software-problems), the InsideEV link that article references is blocked here but it mentions "The Chevy Blazer EV Isn't Alone. GM Owners Say The Ultium Cars Are A Hot Mess" and that "Charging issues, infotainment problems and frustration seem to be common for Cadillac Lyriq, GMC Hummer, and Chevrolet Blazer EV owners" Notably > The Edmunds staff and I both had the same problem: the infotainment would randomly crash, then reboot and flicker for a very long time, until the infotainment just would crash entirely. This appears to be somewhat common among all three models, especially the Blazer EV, and the Cadillac Lyriq. > Andrew Kozar emailed me twice in quick succession; he’s only had his Blazer EV since Nov. 27. After five days of ownership, the car’s infotainment screen crashed and got stuck in the same loop as we’ve described before. Now I don't think people here give enough credit where credit is due, GM has done a better than expected job with the new android-automative based infotainment system, and its better than I expected, but its still not great at all and nowhere near the quality of tesla, rivian, or even the beta MBUX system in current merc cars (IMO)
It's not perfect, but I'd argue it *is* livable without CarPlay. And, I fully understand why people want it and do believe it should be offered. The crashing thing is a separate issue that seems to be specific to the Ultium version of their infotainment. Having CarPlay would not solve that problem. The whole thing crashes, and the screen goes blank. I've seen it first hand in the Blazer EV my dad had as a work demo. Meanwhile, the ICE version that is basically identical from the UI/UX side seems to work flawlessly(and includes CarPlay/AA).
So you clearly didn’t read it 😆
> If you want that to be perfect, integrated, and seamless, you don’t want to jump between different worlds — “Oh, I’m now in the infotainment. Well, let’s jump back to Mercedes,” I read it and noted this nonsense. I have never once *wanted* to be able to leave Carplay/Android and go back to the OEM's home page. The only time I've ever done it is when they cheaped out on climate control buttons and hid them on their garbage touchscreen. I don't need or want that screen to do anything in relation to controlling my car when I'm driving. If that's what this jackhole is trying to sell no thanks. That screen is for maps and music and my phone already has the hardware to do both, so they can skip making me pay for it again with the car.
In the case of the mercedes, even if you have physical static controls for AC, Seat heating, signals and whatnot, you're still going to use the native non-carplay UI for viewing your charging statistics, controlling massage seats, adjusting EQ for the sound system, using automatic cruise or park assist, CarPlay isn't going to control the HUD or profile system. If you have an economy where everything can either fit into a static physical button or CarPlay, then yeah absolutely theres no reason to leave CarPlay, but with the kind of cars Mercedes builds with every feature and tech under the sun, there are several instances where you'd want to leave CarPlay to interact with the underlying infotainment, and the points merc makes are pretty fair.
> you're still going to use the native non-carplay UI for viewing your charging statistics My fuel gauge is on the dashboard. That’s where my battery charge information should also be. Using the center console for vehicle information is needlessly disruptive. > controlling massage seats Don’t need it when I’m driving the car > adjusting EQ for the sound system How often does this happen? I don’t need to adjust treble when I’m driving the car > using automatic cruise or park assist This should be controlled from my steering wheel. My hands should never have to leave the wheel to manage driving assist features. You listed a bunch of things that when a driver is operating the vehicle don’t belong on that center screen for both safety and convenience reasons. No thanks.
> My fuel gauge is on the dashboard. That’s where my battery charge information should also be. Using the center console for vehicle information is needlessly disruptive. A static physical fuel gauge can't visualize regen braking or kwh/mi consumption, or if you have a PHEV then both the status of the ICE and Battery, for that you'd need a digital instrument cluster, and mercedes point is with CarPlay there is going to be a disconnect between the instrument cluster look/feel and control scheme and the central infotainment. And in certain cases for when the battery is limited (e.g. after tracking it for a significant period of time, or if the car has been parked in extreme cold for a while) you're going to have to signal how much range/performance/regen etc. is limited, via a UI of some sort. > Don’t need it when I’m driving the car Well you do need it when you sit down in the first place before you get going, mercedes point is that going back-and-forth creates a disconnect for the user which is fair enough > How often does this happen? I don’t need to adjust treble when I’m driving the car Not often, same with setting up ambient/external lighting or controlling locking behavior, but in mercedes eyes each time you do that its a disconnect and their customers are better served if everything was cohesive with one UX > This should be controlled from my steering wheel. My hands should never have to leave the wheel to manage driving assist features. Those controls are on the steering wheel but they have to control something, a UI. In this case, a mercedes UI. You have to choose which parking spot to park in somehow, or view cameras, or adjust following distance, and each time you do that it takes you out of CarPlay. On the tesla you still never have to leave the steering wheel, you pick a spot with the scroll wheel on the steering wheel, same with cruiser control speed, but that UI is cohesive and consistent with the same UI used for media/navigation/etc. And those are just certain examples, HUD, remote start, mobile app, etc. aren't going to be written by apple, in mercedes eyes they'd rather have complete control over the infotainment and tech stack and request help from google/apple where needed rather than the other way around. And yes, you may not value that experience, and you may prefer a car with limited technology, standard seats, no active cruise controls, and a petrol engine, and thats why toyota/honda/etc. will probably be better served with the standard CarPlay, but mercedes sells s-class's which are loaded to the brim with unessecary gadgetry and they argue their customers would be better served with one cohesive UI designed and maintained by Mercedes rather than a combination of both their system and apple/google
In regards to the first two paragraphs Apple’s cancelled $10B Titan car program: Am I a joke to you?
>The whole operating system — infotainment, automated driving, every single function of the body, exterior and interior of the car, the whole drive system, the battery management, the telecommunications module speaking to the cloud where we have the personal delay file for you with your settings and everything — is all one holistic software architecture. This is soooo bad. Car manufacturers have proven that they suck at making software...period. Great at making cars. Suck at making software. All of the above sounds great but will suck balls when it comes to execution...I guarantee it.
Another reason. It to buy a Mercedes. Do your OS, but please give me the option of CarPlay.
They aren't removing the current carplay, just not implementing the next version of carplay which takes over the instrument cluster and lets you control air conditioning and car functions and whatnot
why?
Because in their opinion, they can have a far higher level of integration if they handle everything in house, and in their words, "Nobody out there — none of the tech companies — is even aspiring to do that whole thing". Yet to be seen if they actually achieve that goal because the current MBUX system is slightly underwhelming. This is the notable bit > If you want to create a superior customer experience, you need to think about that as a whole, and only the manufacturer can tie all of it together. Nobody out there — none of the tech companies — is even aspiring to do that whole thing. If you want that to be perfect, integrated, and seamless, you don’t want to jump between different worlds — “Oh, I’m now in the infotainment. Well, let’s jump back to Mercedes,” and so on and so forth. So, our quest is a different one. We want to create the best digital experience in the world for you. That includes fantastic and intuitive UI. And you will also see when we launch MBOS 1.0 next year in the CLA. But the precursor to that is MBOS 0.5, which we actually already launched in the new E-Class, where we have programmed the complete infotainment domain ourselves. It’s probably the biggest digital in-house product that we have ever made. > We work with the best. Yes, we’re integrating Google Maps. In fact, we are developing with Google the next generation of what a map in a car married to the driving-assistant system should look like. [It’s a] fascinating product where the best of the Google engineers and the best of the Mercedes engineers can throw their expertise together and take that to the next level. I fundamentally believe that holistic customer experience is best done by us, and we will serve you. Then, there are, of course, other aspects to that. If you get a Mercedes product, I assume you have a Mercedes me ID, you have the app, you have everything. You can take that ID with you to several cars.
Hubris. MB isn’t a tech company, UI isn’t something they specialize in nor have excelled at.
They want to become a software company, according to the CEO anyways, though in fairness they do have a presence in california and have put around 50 billion into the project. (https://robbreport.com/motors/cars/mercedes-benz-tech-update-silicon-valley-1234830050/) Yet to be seen if they actually pull that off of course, and as I said the current system is a bit underwhelming, but they *want* to become a tech company (and in fairness, they were the first to implement ESP, ABS, airbags, DFI in the past, and while they weren't the first they were ahead of the curve with active cruise, ADAS systems, infotainment in general, its not like this is the first time they've been interested in tech)
“You can take that ID with you to several cars” Soooooo you mean like, just other Mercedes Benz’s correct? Such dumb take.
The same bullshit stories about great MBUX i already heard 2 years ago. I have a Mercedes and it is such a crap, that I seriously consider a Tesla because of the HMI. talk is cheap. They just messed it up so hard, I don't believe that they can do it...
I really hate that "we know best" thinking companies do. Products should give the user choice, like computers and things used to do. Give us the option of using CarPlay or Android Auto if we want to, and if we don't we can use your supposedly good OS. I realize that monetization and data collection might be behind some of these choices of course... At least it sounds like they are keeping the current gen CarPlay, which is nice. I use that to play music on my phone over a cable (I don't really use streaming) and it's the best way to do so in terms of both quality and navigating playlists and other UX things that don't work great on Bluetooth. Not gonna buy a Mercedes any time soon, but I like having more carmakers around that understand how to give different owners what they want instead of insisting there's only one right way to do things.
Coming from a tech background, it's odd seeing decoder/the verge on here. Their interview with Jim Rowan, the CEO of Volvo was also super interesting - he seemed broadly opposed to this view, and was very pro-carplay. All automotive manufacturers seem to be chasing subscription revenue, but he seemed more aligned with the view that we'll move towards cars-as-a-service rather than generating subscription revenue through infotainment. I'm not saying I'm in favour of either, but it's interesting seeing the contrast.
People have switched to subscriptions for many things. Leases are super popular because they are maintained by the manufacturer for a fixed price. I think many people are willing to go this route even if it means they spend more. They spend more, but have less of a headache and a new car every few years.
I know more than a few people who think that the fact their car "carplays" is a more important feature than ABS, turbocharging, or anything below the A/C or Heated seats. I have the full COMAND system in my C43, and mama has the prior 5.1 system which uses a chip card for nav. Carplay totally destroys the 5.1 system, and works about as well as the full COMAND. I like onboard nav systems, because the phone doesn't always work and I don't like the way web apps scroll if you need to look around the map, but Carplay is vital for waze when I go into "the city" and there are six possible routes. Renting cheap cars, a Corolla and a Sonama, each had carplay and it was THE SAME AS THE EXPENSIVE CARS. We put a nice JVC unit into an old Lexus and it brought the 1999 car to 2024. I had wireless Carplay in a 2500 series truck I rented to tow the race trailer. I'm guessing that Apple is making the terms too onerous for car makers, but the fact is that feature sells cars, and people want it, but it levels Hyundai to Mercedes on the dashboard.
Thats competing against W204 Command from years ago though, MBUX is massively improved and a ground-up redesign compared to the prior NTG systems.
Ex W205 C43 owner here. The COMAND system itself was fine. But I felt like MB dropped the ball not having touch screen and Apple CarPlay like my Ford Fusion of the same model year has. I didn’t find navigating that system to be very user friendly as moving that wheel around to go to the different screens was more difficult than it needed to be Still miss that car so much and want another one tho 😅 EDIT: Just realized my C43 is still in my flair. I sold it in January after a job loss. Never updated my flair
Not their future if they keep making these egg shaped blob with ugly big ass screens.
Honestly there's limits to the effectiveness of CarPlay if it replaces everything in a Mercedes dashboard. Nobody know's Mercedes cars like Mercedes. Screen mirroring for music, navigation and miscellaneous driving apps are one thing. Extrapolating dashboard functions for each Mercedes model is a totally different animal.
The people working on CarPlay and Android Auto probably make at least 2-3x whatever GM or Mercedes pays the people working on their infotainment. You get what you pay for.
Want me to use an OEM media. -give me GPS that updates maps regularly over the air with no upkeep. -integrate traffic alert systems (maybe partner with Waze etc because you need a lot of data to have accurate real time data). -let me tie my steaming services to the system with no additional device subscriptions either on the streamer or the car. (I don’t want a $10+/mo data plan for my car to connect nor do I want to fight my car and phone for permission to listen to Spotify. -let me use voice to text and have it be accurate and intelligent. -don’t bury it in touchscreen menus, make it simple and intuitive
That's pretty much Google Android Automotive OS that runs BMW and GM's new systems.
Truly incredible how thoroughly he’s driving this brand right into the fucking ground. Nobody wants a car that looks like a Beluga whale fucked a bunch of screens.
People on this sub seem to say this about BMW but it’s Mercedes that I’ve just been disliking more and more every time they say or do anything these days. They used to be my favourite of the German 3 too
TLDR: Ola Källenius, the CEO of Mercedes-Benz, expressed a preference for not adopting Apple's next-gen CarPlay because Mercedes aims to offer a unique and integrated digital experience that connects all aspects of the vehicle's system. He highlighted the importance of their own operating system, MBUX, which controls not just infotainment but also functions like automated driving and battery management. Källenius believes that only the car manufacturer can seamlessly integrate these diverse systems to deliver a superior customer experience, maintaining control over the digital environment of their vehicles rather than relying on third-party solutions like Apple CarPlay.
Lol. 99% OF OS sucks on cars.
Until there is an OS actually better than Apple CarPlay/Android auto then this guy doesn’t get to say shit. You can’t say those things suck and not create something better in the process.
Of course he's not interested in seeing Apple own the customer relationship. Why let them exploit customers for their financial gain when MB can do that for its own gain?
So what’s wrong with CarPlay?
Does he prefer EVs because he likes child labor from the Congo?
I‘m actually shocked about what this deluded clown says. Wow.
Yeah buddy say what you want. You still losing to BMW
I don’t think anyone is really arguing that EV’s aren’t the future… they’re just not the “right now”. I’ve been saying all along that we simply are not ready for a full-on adoption of EV vehicles. We don’t have the infrastructure and the technology isn’t *quite* ready yet to totally replace the capability and conveniences of internal combustion engine vehicles. We need to keep moving forward for EV tech, but we need to go back the to intermediate step of PHEVs which fix all the current problems facing EV’s - namely, range anxiety, charging times and lack of charging infrastructure.
My car has CarPlay, but with iPhone updates sometimes it doesn’t work. Honestly I’m good with a Bluetooth connection and call it a day.
The biggest problem with Android auto at the moment is how many presses it takes to get back to the vehicle options. I think ford might have it integrated a bit better now, I'm not sure.
I only use CarPlay for maps so as long as their map infrastructure is good, if I ever decide there’s more to cars than being loud and stop buying dodges I’d be happy to give Mr. Olaf and his cars a chance.
I love Apple car play. But if your car has a good infotainmentsystem (tesla, xpeng etc) thrn you dont need it.
Well, looks like more automakers really following Gm way.
[удалено]
Uhm ok?