GM Says It’s Ditching Apple CarPlay and Android Auto for Your Safety::undefined
GM says Apple and Android have access to a ton of data on consumer habits in their vehicles that those systems don’t share with the auto manufacturer, so they’re ditching those systems in favour of their own that gives them direct access to all that user data under the guise of a safety change.
“Consumer habits.” What does that even mean in the context of a car? If we are talking about CarPlay/AA and not a replacement of the underlying automotive OS, it’s literally just a phone. Apple and Google can track what their users do with their phones. They can’t see how a user interacts with the car, beyond maybe inferring driving habits from speed and location?
GM is full of shit, there’s no need for them to be privy to how I use my phone, I already get enough of that shit from Apple.
Yes of course GM only has its customers’ data’s best interests at heart i’m sure…
I’m ditching ever considering them for a vehicle purchase for my own sanity.
Fucking OEM infotainment systems are bullshit and I will never buy a car ever again that doesn’t support CarPlay and Android Auto.
It doesn’t even really need that.
All we actually need is a Bluetooth receiver, maybe a FM radio for backup.
I would be 100% fine with that. If I want my car to have a screen, I’ll stick my phone to the dashboard somewhere.
My current car has a regular double DIN head unit in it, which I can take out and replace at will (or just replace with a big 3D printed pocket for all I care). I am dreading ever having to purchase a newer car, because I know it’s going to be wall-to-wall integrated proprietary electronic bullshit blaring in my face and nagging for subscriptions all the time and it’ll be impossible to disable or remove.
I have a car with the bullshit.
The built-in Bluetooth is laggy, and this on what was a high end car at the time.
Glad I got it for less than half of new price.
People ask me why I have so many motorcycles. Lots of reasons, really.
But I think I just decided on a new one. All of my motorcycles have no bullshit. A full manual riding experience; one engine, two wheels, the road, you. End of list. Two of them are fancy enough that they include a clock. That’s the full extent of rider distraction features.
Two of them are fancy enough that they include a clock.
Man after my own heart!
I have one of those, it’s a nearly 30 year old motorcycle, engineered in the 80’s. Still gets 30mpg all day long. Gets more if I’m easy on the throttle and doing longer trips. But the clock is rarely right (battery is often dead cause I’m lazy).
My only complaint is bloody carbs. Uggh. Those things are 19th century black magic (and I grew up working on engines with carbs, so I understand, but loathe them). Fuel injection was a game changer for automotive reliability. Fortunately you can buy add-on FI for most car engines, and it just works.
Android Auto / Car Play Nav systems are the best though. Although the stock one has a HUD on mine.
Good choice. We have a 2023 Suburban for work, robot didn’t seal our passenger door correctly, steering wheel misaligned from factory, they installed a broken door panel on the rear passenger second row door, electrical gremlins make the auto mirrors adjust randomly, backup system sees ghosts. Absolute embarrassing they ask $80,000 for this. We got it brand new with zero miles.
I considered the Suburban but ultimately chose the Ford Expedition Max. I’m glad I did, I couldn’t be happier with it. Android Auto is on all the time. No issues whatsoever. Got it new in '21.
Tbh I was already no longer considering them. My previous car was GM and got junked before 10 years were up. Now I’m driving a Nissan still going strong (edit: on year 10 right now), haven’t even had any major problem yet (knock on wood). By year 7, the GM had a replacement engine, clutch and starter. And I was living with the fuel gauge not resetting to zero properly when it started so having no idea how much fuel was in the tank until the low fuel light came on.
This experience has been so much better that it will take a lot to get me to consider an American brand over a Japanese one.
This feels like something a C-suite came up with to carve out extra profit and had some bean counters crunch the numbers on, fluffed them up a bit and then had the company roll with it on his idea.
I’m usually disappointed by consumer apathy, but from everyone I talk to who has a car with a screen, if they have CarPlay/Android Auto they couldn’t do without it, and if they don’t have it it’s the biggest thing they wish they had.
I’ve ridden with a friend who has it and uses it a lot, and I can understand the attraction for users who like to be connected while driving. The speech to text stuff actually worked pretty well. I don’t feel desire for it myself, but for me its absence is at most a minor inconvenience.
It does seem like it could mostly be replaced by a software app though, plus some kind of dash mount for a phone.
Fwiw there are aftermarket options do add it through USB.
The hardware would have to support video input via USB though. I think if we’re talking about car electronics, more than likely those addons use wired Android Auto and are really meant for cars that don’t support it wirelessly.
Unless, of course, you’re talking about some aftermarket head units as well in which case all bets are off.
What they mean is that you have zero reason to pay GM $20 a month for their substandard, unsecure garbage navigation and cloud services, and that’s not allowed.
Lmao. Shortly followed by their own systems that are subscription based.
As if I needed another reason to not buy a GM.
Even if they manage to get big players like Spotify to develop apps for them, a lot of people - at least on the Android side - have smaller, niche apps for audiobooks and podcasts that would never bother to port their apps to GM services. Heck, even Apple Music and YouTube Music wouldn’t bother. I smell an upcoming BOGO deal on their overstocked dealerships, just before they get another bailout check.
Currently, this a dealbreaker for me. As in I won’t buy a vehicle that does this, or charges me a subscription fee for a built in feature like heated seats.
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GM is seriously so fucking trash. Everyone I have ever known with a GM product had seriously regretted it within 6 months.
I’ve put 160,000 miles on my Impala. I’ve had to replace a vent solonoid once, took like 10 minutes in the driveway. Also had an evap solonoid go bad. Other than that it’s been oil, brakes, and tires. 8 years on and still my daily driver.
Just like every other brand, you have to know which models, years, bodystyles, powertrains, etc have excessive issues and avoid them, then hope you don’t get the 1/100 that’s a lemon.
There really needs to be a standardised open protocol rather than Android Auto and Apple CarPlay.
There’s no reason why I shouldn’t be able to use a non-Apple/Google app for my in-car infotainment. Apple and Google just want our data.
Let Android Auto and CarPlay be options in a competing market, rather than zero choice and just having to use whatever your phone provides.
There are aftermarket options to support screen mirroring over usb, so I think it is possible. Is anyone else putting in the work to compete with Google and Apple? I’ve been watching as Google ads integration to various cars - as an example they didn’t show turn by turn directions on the screen behind the steering wheel a while ago, and added it on Honda at some point. These features take investment, and perhaps the OSS options aren’t keeping up?
There needs to be a lot more to it than just screen monitoring, it needs to recognise touch inputs, high-fidelity, low-latency audio (both ways), and importantly the car needs to be able to send information back to the device (is the handbrake on, are the headlights on, etc). That requires integration from the carmaker.
Open source solutions at the moment cannot be used with in-car infotainment, because of that requirement that the car needs to send information to the device. I think there should be an open protocol for this that all cars implement.
Imagine if we had a functioning Congress that could respond to these (and other) new tech advances with real standards that move technology forward safely and responsibly.
What a world we could have.
I just want to buy a 90’s car without a stupid iPad bolted to the dashboard, an electronically actuated parking brake, or hundreds of worthless, permanently enabled nannies keeping me from doing what I want to with my own car and making repairs hundreds more expensive than they should be.
Imagine being able to buy a brand new 90s Corolla for 10k. That’d be nice
I recently saw a 94 corolla with like 2400 miles on it while car shopping online. I guess it just got bought, parked, and forgotten about. It was in spectacular condition.
It was also $26,000.
It was a Honda Accord iirc. Saw the same post…
I have a 2019 car, manual transmission, knobs and switches for climate and heated seats, and a touch screen for carplay. It’s the best.
I love the ones that pop up as soon as you start driving that say “keep your eyes on the road!” 🤦♂️
My 07 Accord is all old school. I installed a bt adapter and I’m happy as fuck.
I don’t want to even rent a car without CarPlay. Good luck with that GM.
there is a strong demographic of us which hate that shit. knobs and switches gang
CarPlay exists fine with knobs and switches. It’s just a solid integration for playing audio and having a solid GPS view with Apple Maps/Google Maps/Waze. It doesn’t inherently require giving up knobs and switches.
Do do I, but those two things are not mutually exclusive
Some are better than others. You can control CarPlay without touching the screen in Mazdas for example.
I don’t think you’re using the word “strong” correctly.
Anyway, all you have to do is just NOT plug your phone onto the car.
Tim Babbitt, GM’s head of product for infotainment, gave MT a better explanation at a press event for the new Chevrolet Blazer EV, the flagship vehicle in the no CarPlay or Android Auto strategy (and our 2023 MotorTrend SUV of the Year winner). According to him, there’s an important factor that didn’t make it into the fact sheet: safety. Specifically, he cited driver distraction caused by cell phone usage behind the wheel.
How exactly will this disincentivize phone use? Wouldn’t this encourage hands-on phone use instead of using a UI that limits interaction?
I feel like this is a solvable engineering problem.
Sounds more like an excuse to double down on their own “infotainment” development.
I thought ford had a garbage interface until I drove a gm. They’re about to officially be an old fart car only. No one below 40 will buy a car without apple or android interfaces.
Knowing GM they will lobby to ban Apple CarPlay and Android Auto.
safety
Lol
