Miguel Santana
Casey LissWherein I nearly have an aneurism while listening to a podcast.
https://www.caseyliss.com/2025/10/6/youre-missing-the-point
https://www.caseyliss.com/2025/10/6/youre-missing-the-point
Hunter Hillegas@caseyliss Classic case of them doing what’s best for them instead of their customers (and trying to justify it as “experience”). Their software is cool but come on, give me a CarPlay window/app! My wife wants an R2 but the CarPlay thing gives her pause.
zkarj@caseyliss I'm sure EVERY car manufacturer thinks THEIR system is great. We all know it's just not true.
I find it hard to believe the Toyota exec who OK'd the system in a car I rented late 2024 was thinking "screw the driver, let's make their life a misery" but that is exactly what resulted.
My (least) favourite part was the navigation that always showed the map NORTH UP! Not just terrible, but actively dangerous.
Joel@caseyliss I own a Rivian and my wife has a Honda prologue. The only thing her car does better than mine is utilize CarPlay as an app. It’s a perfect implementation.
Michael Cook@caseyliss I don’t need a car right now. But when I was last shopping CarPlay was a non-negotiable. I wasn’t giving it up.
When I replace my current car one day, I’m not giving it up.
If something crazy happens and I switch to Android? I’m not giving up Android Auto.
Rules out brands for me *real fast*.
tylerhall@caseyliss My favorite example of a "seamless digital experience" is my 2025 Kia. Their native infotainment system will let me stream from any music provider using the car's built-in cell connection...as long as it's Amazon Music 🙄
Simon Woods@caseyliss This seems like an especially short-sighted approach from any such company at the moment, given that Apple have just introduced their newest chip _dedicated to wireless connectivity_. Assuming the phone gets better at those things, any company that gets in the way — or outright blocks it — is surely going to take enough of a hit to notice.
Bryan Irace@caseyliss Dude I want an R3 so badly (have an Ioniq5 currently). Would be an insta-buy if it had CarPlay. So frustrating.
@irace how do you like the 5??
Josh@caseyliss @irace I’d also like to hear about your experience with the 5 and what you expect to be better about the R3 from what you’ve seen them announce.
I’ve had the Ioniq 5 for two whole days after my last car getting randomly totaled. Pretty sweet so far.
@Nizdar @caseyliss Big fan for the most part! A bunch of small nits and I did have a battery issue that they appear to have fixed. I’m halfway through a two-year lease.
Honestly just like the R3 aesthetics a lot more. I think there’s a good chance I stick with the I5 even after my lease is up, if for no reason other than the R3 probably not being out yet.
But also, CarPlay.
Patrick O'Sullivan@caseyliss Rivian’s software is definitely not “that good”. They recently fixed a big item by switching to Google Maps. It’s “good enough” that for short trips I won’t run Waze in parallel (on my phone which has to be dash mounted for visibility). But every single time I pause a podcast via their screen, I bemoan lack of CarPlay as their interface has enough lag to make me think I didn’t actually hit the touch target correctly. Every. Single. Time.
Mutesplash@caseyliss Resist being irrational American with R3. Drag less stuff around!
@Mutesplash the R3 is roughly the size of my Golf… isn’t it?
@caseyliss Golf is a car and R3 a SUV, right? One sits on the floor and the other on a box. It looks a lot taller.
@Mutesplash R3 is a hatch, and low, AFAIK
@caseyliss Looks pretty high to me https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rivian_R3
@Mutesplash lol, I think the opposite
@caseyliss After poking around on the internet I have realized I am an old who thinks the Golf R is six inches lower than it actually is. Cars are huge now. This _and_ the Golf seem barely different than an Ioniq 5 or a Model Y, both I would consider SUVs.
Patrick Toomey@caseyliss "There’s no reason Rivian can’t have their bespoke and seamless experience .." - Logically this seems true..but in practice I think it creates challenges. Let's say Google maps via carplay was there day 1 on Rivian. It becomes that much harder to ever justify their internal maps are the next most important fire that needs funding. It creates a tricky incentive structure throughout the org chart. Short of a Steve Jobs like level of founder micro-managing..it could be hard to overcome.
@caseyliss Put another way...what is the incentive structure at the car companies that do support carplay to ever improve? It feels like many of them have largely just "given up" and assume that their infotainment experience from 2001 if "just fine" since nobody will really use that..they will all just use carplay/android auto. I think RJ (and others going down the non-carplay route) are so fearful of that, they are willing to risk maybe "overcorrecting" too far the other direction.
@ptoomey3 I don’t see why them just ceding control to CarPlay is a bad thing
Hell, this is why CP ultra exists
@caseyliss Imagine if Apple, seeing Windows' dominance, had said “Fine, we’ll just ship Windows on our Macs...after all...it's just a stupid computer...it's the windows apps that really everyone wants access to.”. I'm not saying cars are the next computing revolution. But...one has to believe that the likes of RJ are there because they genuinely believe there is innovation to be had..and they want to setup the incentive structure to make it happen.
@ptoomey3 if it’s important to them — as they claim it is — then it will get done.
@caseyliss But it's not how incentive structures work (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invisible_hand) ..they setup the conditions for people to act like..people. I don't deny it's _possible_ ...it's just very very hard to do...again..short of a Steve Jobs level of founder micro-management.
Chasen@caseyliss I’m assuming you listened to the rest of what he said after that—I thought the gist of what he said was that he doesn’t want to interfere with people bringing their preferred experiences to the car, but CP Ultra goes too far in not giving them the flexibility they need for some new functionality. Am I being too charitable?
@chasen That's what he said, but I don't buy it.
Paul Chernoff@caseyliss Nice post. Another reason, which I might have missed, is that by using CarPlay all of my data is in sync. Apple Maps remembers all my stuff and is useful when I rent a car. Overcast knows my podcasts and what I've listened to, trying to keep track by having Overcast and another app on a car would be a nightmare. Plus privacy issues.
My car is my iPhone's most expensive accessory. The iPhone is not my car's accessory.
David Anson@paulc @caseyliss Right, that’s what I don’t understand… Best case for Rivian is that they offer a version of every app I care about on my phone AND I sign into every one of them on their car AND they all sync their data between car and phone seamlessly. I just don’t see that happening, so I don’t understand how they think they can deliver an experience that even approaches parity with phone+CarPlay.
Jeff Clatworthy@caseyliss.
“My car is my iPhone's most expensive accessory. The iPhone is not my car's accessory.”
The Zinger that is the crux of what terrifies the Auto companies.
Dana Scott@paulc @caseyliss And this is why I’ll not own a car without CarPlay.
Salvo@paulc @caseyliss
In #Australia in 2012, people would walk into a Holden Dealership, ask if the car had CarPlay (and/or Android Auto) and then walk straight out.
When the VF Commodore was introduced, CarPlay and Android Auti was removed as a feature in lieu of hard-coded support for Pandora. (Three months later, Pandora cancelled all Australian service).
When the VF2 came out, the didn’t restore CarPlay/Android Auto.
@paulc @caseyliss
This is one of the reasons I left Holden.
5 years after I left, the entire institution was shuttered.
Holden does not exist any more.
ZS@Salvo @paulc @caseyliss Well, outside of the US, GM doesn't exist any more. All brands were sucked up by the dumpster fire that is Stellantis.
@ZS @paulc @caseyliss
Can someone please tell the Australian Seppophiles who buy oversized Silverados and try to drive them on normal roads.
Can someone please tell the Australian Seppophiles who buy oversized Silverados and try to drive them on normal roads.
@Salvo @paulc @caseyliss European GM vehicles were mostly Vauxhall/Opel designed, only their SUVs were the remaining Daewoo junk, and by the 2010s there was only the Mokka left from that family.
Now the GM brands are bagged engineered Peugeot vehicles, thanks to the Stellantis buyout
Alexander Krumeich@paulc @caseyliss This. I don’t own a car but use car sharing a lot. It’s immensely helpful to bring your own satnav, music, podcasts. I couldn’t care less about the manufacturer’s entertainment and navigation system.
Danny Whitt@caseyliss 💯 CarPlay is what the pros call a “tent pole” feature for me but I was never able to articulate it like this: Smartphone-centric vs. Vehicle-centric. Perfect. They’ll, unfortunately, never get it though.
Adam Bell 
@caseyliss once again, a hilariously bad take (from Rivian).
If you create an experience that's so seamless and so good, that it eclipses CarPlay… people won't use CarPlay!
Otherwise, you're just knee-capping the infotainment system for your customers
@b3ll @caseyliss
There are three reasons why an automotive manufacturer would not include CarPlay or Android Auto.
1. They don’t want Google collecting telemetry on their vehicles drivers (See Porsche).
2. They think they can make money by selling their own apps to their vehicles drivers (ie GM, BMW).
3. They are fascists and want to control All-The-Things or data brokers and sell their vehicle owners data to the cheapest bidders.
Andrew@Nowicki @b3ll @caseyliss
Yes.
Walled Gardens without Competent Gatekeepers.
Although at least the App Store and Play Store do have reviewers who(‘s Primary Job is supposed to be to) verify the quality and integrity of the Apps.
The Vehcile manufacturers just have one executive that makes a decision and doesn’t follow it up for 10 years.
Sören@chucker @b3ll @caseyliss
I reckon that comes under Reason 3.
Although Reason 3 is doing a lot of heavy lifting.
Maybe 5 reasons…
sijt@caseyliss It’s the same hubris that leads app developers to use non-standard media players because they think you want the same experience watching their content when jumping between iOS, Apple TV, windows and your smart tv. As if that’s what any real person cares about because they use lots of different apps from many different companies. Sheer arrogance and the weird cultish view of product managers that their product is the only one that exists.
Leon Cowle@caseyliss Another BIG reason is safety. I know the CarPlay interface very well. My attention diversions are minimized as I interact with it (maps, Overcast, etc) while driving. Including when I get a new car. Or a rental in an unfamiliar place.
I don’t ever have to struggle through an unfamiliar UI.
Nigel Wadsworth 🇦🇺@caseyliss Yep. CarPlay is one of my favourite Apple products. My Volvo EV is a great iPhone accessory. Way better than its built in Android Automotive, which by itself is ‘functional’.
Lex Friedman@caseyliss come borrow mine
Wayne Dixon@caseyliss “Sitting here now, I will not buy another car that does not support CarPlay”
When I was looking at cars (I started looking in 2021 and didn’t buy until 2023), CarPlay was a requirement for me. If it didn’t have CarPlay, it was not considered. Not a “nice to have”, but a requirement. I would’ve preferred wireless CarPlay, but wired CarPlay is perfectly fine for me.
I buy cars so seldom that I wanted to get what I wanted in the car, and CarPlay is a must.
_IanOfEarth@caseyliss I really want an R3x when the time comes and I was really hoping this stance would soften over time, but seems like both of those wants are doomed.
Another auto-manufacturer will get my money when the time comes.
James Scariati@caseyliss I just bought my first car with CarPlay earlier this year (complete with wireless charging). I got used to it *really* quickly and now would never even consider buying another car without it. I think any car manufacturer that doesn’t support it is shooting themselves in the foot.
David Platt@caseyliss current Rivian software does not support texting in any way. There’s a native Apple Music app, but beyond that nothing. No way to interact with Siri. You can talk to Alexa, but that’s limited. Texting support has been teased but still AWOL.
benostrander@caseyliss My hot take is that it’s not offered so they can get ongoing subscription revenue from customers. You need a subscription to use Apple Music natively in a Rivian. That in addition to your mobile phone subscription and Apple Music subscription. Judging by Reddit comments, the integration is not great. I’d gladly pay $5-10 a month for a CarPlay subscription
@caseyliss Also, as of this moment in time Rivian does not offer text support. According to the interview it is coming and will some how be something amazing (whatever that means)
0xDECAFBAD@benostrander @caseyliss > it’s not offered so they can get ongoing subscription revenue from customers
It’s this, exactly, for all the manufacturers that are dropping CarPlay and Android Auto. I find it tiresome that interviews always parrot the bs talking point that it’s about “driver experience” when they change tire OEMs to whoever gives them the cheapest deal regardless of how they ride. (1/2)
It’s this, exactly, for all the manufacturers that are dropping CarPlay and Android Auto. I find it tiresome that interviews always parrot the bs talking point that it’s about “driver experience” when they change tire OEMs to whoever gives them the cheapest deal regardless of how they ride. (1/2)
Eliminating smartphone nav locks the driver into OEM subscription navigation. Controlling the entertainment system means they can slice and dice subscription features there as well. But what they really want is that behavioral data that they can also sell as ongoing revenue stream on top of all the subscription deals. (2/2)
Bodo Tasche@caseyliss so Volkswagen will use rivian os for their next cars (they have shares in Rivian because they had “issues” creating their own OS). Curious if they have to implement CarPlay for them in the OS. I don’t think that VW management would release a car in Europe without CarPlay.
Janne Ojaniemi@bitboxer @caseyliss ironically, current native VW software seems to be fine. Not great, but fine, you could live with it. And it supports CarPlay, which makes it better than Tesla or Rivian for me, no matter how good their native software is.
@Janne_O @caseyliss yeah…the problem is that they had to postpone releases of cars by 2 years because the software side did not deliver on time. It was just a huge mess with the “we have thousands of suppliers and need to cram it all together in one working system” vs the “lets build a big computer and attach everything to it” approach.