Car makers will offer Android Auto alongside CarPlay later this year

Would be awesome to get my Google Now cards right on the main display. I'm sure we will hear more soon.

This is disappointing.

If anyone can add it with relative ease it would be Tesla. This would be killer. Several Google Execs sport Tesla's we can hope...

EDIT: This is quoted from an article on "The Verge" - "Android Auto works by plugging in an Android phone running the L operating system. The phone displays an "A" on the screen and you can no longer operate it. Instead, the phone sends up its information to your car's display. Google calls it "casting," but the key thing to know is that very little of the smarts of Android Auto live in the car's computer — the whole thing is run off of your phone."

If that's true Tesla may simply need to add something similar to Chromecast functionality to the Model S to pickup on the "casting" from your mobile device. It would be fantastic if it was all bluetooth so it wouldn't require any hardware modifications.

gbdesai said:

If anyone can add it with relative ease it would be Tesla. This would be killer. Several Google Execs sport Tesla's we can hope...

EDIT: This is quoted from an article on "The Verge" - "Android Auto works by plugging in an Android phone running the L operating system. The phone displays an "A" on the screen and you can no longer operate it. Instead, the phone sends up its information to your car's display. Google calls it "casting," but the key thing to know is that very little of the smarts of Android Auto live in the car's computer — the whole thing is run off of your phone."

If that's true Tesla may simply need to add something similar to Chromecast functionality to the Model S to pickup on the "casting" from your mobile device. It would be fantastic if it was all bluetooth so it wouldn't require any hardware modifications.

Click to expand...

Can't be. The aspect ratio of the screen and size needs to be known to work. Also, need to know what kind of inputs are going to be used and car will have to send that info to the phone (i.e. touch screen coordinates, cursor controller). How do you get the phone images on screen without hardware mods? Chromecast works on TVs because aspect ratio and screen resolution are known and you have an HDMI input available.

The same way Remote Desktop, Airplay, VNC, etc work. They were all software based. As long as Tesla can render a container client it could communicate all the pertinent info to the phone to render properly with all processing done at the phone.

Tesla better have plans to add Apple CarPlay and Android Auto functionality. Just add both -- although the Windows Phone contingent won't be happy (but Microsoft doesn't have this type of functionally, at least yet). If Volvo, Honda and Hyundai can support both on cars coming out this year, you can beat them to it by rolling it out to all existing Model S!

Gary -
This doesn't actually put the OS in the car... Instead, its basically a type of remote display that lets you view output from the phone on the car, and provide input back to the phone for controls. The aspect ratio can be different than the phone -- and it would most likely be a 1/2 screen app on a Tesla implementation. I'm sure there will be some minimum hardware specs, but the Tesla's Nvidia-powered center screen should more than meet those... The Apple CarPlay implementations shown a few months ago all have different hardware and different input methods -- Volvo's being capacitative touch, Ferrari's with resistive touch, and Mercede's with the knob based control and no touch...

Last I remember Microsoft showed a car concept at this year's Build conference.

ZBB said:

Tesla better have plans to add Apple CarPlay and Android Auto functionality. Just add both -- although the Windows Phone contingent won't be happy (but Microsoft doesn't have this type of functionally, at least yet). If Volvo, Honda and Hyundai can support both on cars coming out this year, you can beat them to it by rolling it out to all existing Model S!

Click to expand...

Here's a demo of both Android Auto and Apple CarPlay on a 2015 Hyundai… Both are supported on the same car. Come on Tesla, give us this functionality!!!

Apple CarPlay vs Google Android Auto - Comparison! - YouTube

Side Note: This is the first time I've seen an Android Auto demo -- I'll give kudos to Google since it looks great. I'm an iPhone user, and would very happy to get CarPlay in my Tesla...

The list of useful improvements to the Model S software is getting pretty long...

Since we still don't have basic features like playlists - what are the odds we'll see CarPlay or Android Auto soon???

bob_p said:

The list of useful improvements to the Model S software is getting pretty long...

Since we still don't have basic features like playlists - what are the odds we'll see CarPlay or Android Auto soon???

Click to expand...

Probably depends on how optimistic you are: do we lack shuffle and playlists because it would be throw-away work as CarPlay and Android Auto support are in-progress, or do we lack them because Tesla doesn't have the resources to add them?

Has anyone ever done a poll to see what phone OS are used by Tesla owners? I have to guess that it would be skewed towards Apple - I believe in the US the current numbers are 52% market share for Android and 42% for Apple. But I am guessing that in the higher income demographics, which would definitely include Tesla owners, Apple would be way over 50%.

ZBB said:

Here's a demo of both Android Auto and Apple CarPlay on a 2015 Hyundai… Both are supported on the same car. Come on Tesla, give us this functionality!!!

Click to expand...

This would be an easy way to support Spotify and other music apps as some of these are already supported in CarPlay.

thing is though - Tesla have spend a huge amount sorting out the interface for the car - my impression of both Apple and Android is that they basically take over the head unit.
Not sure I would want a generic Google or Apple only experience compared to the Tesla one

Tesla has enough customers using both Apple and Android - to justify supporting both platforms.

Android owners have been second class citizens because the Apple Tesla app gets new features well in advance of the Android app.

Tesla needs to do SOMETHING to provide better integration with smartphones. While Android Auto and Apple CarPlay would be great options - Tesla could probably implement smaller improvements faster and with fewer resources.

Better integration with smartphones is a SAFETY issue - because drivers will use their smartphones, even without the integration - and if the functionality is integrated with the onboard software, it is more likely to be less distracting using voice control or simpler interfaces than having drivers try to use the interfaces on their smartphones - while driving - which is bad, but is being done by many drivers.

At a minimum, Tesla should allocate some developer resources to focus on smartphone integration - and if that happened, we might get some features that should be relatively easy to implement - such as text messaging or better control of media playback from the devices.

wayner said:

Has anyone ever done a poll to see what phone OS are used by Tesla owners? I have to guess that it would be skewed towards Apple - I believe in the US the current numbers are 52% market share for Android and 42% for Apple. But I am guessing that in the higher income demographics, which would definitely include Tesla owners, Apple would be way over 50%.

Click to expand...

Last year there was an informal poll. It was like 60/40 in favor of Apple, a slight lead but not dominant. Support for both would be prudent.

Twiglett said:

thing is though - Tesla have spend a huge amount sorting out the interface for the car - my impression of both Apple and Android is that they basically take over the head unit.
Not sure I would want a generic Google or Apple only experience compared to the Tesla one

Click to expand...

They don't do generic car control, only the media/navigation subsystem. We already have Media in a window, so integration with CarPlay and Android Auto would be clean. They could easily just be a new half-screen window you can interact with. No reason to replace the entire Tesla UI.

As an alternative to the smartphone integration products, would the ability to display the smartphone's user interface on the 17" touchscreen be almost as good?

There are screen mirroring apps for the smartphones - it might be easier for Tesla to pay for the port of an Apple and Android screen mirroring app to the Tesla infotainment system - and then let us access our smartphones on the large display.

This wouldn't be as good as CarPlay or Android Auto - but might be an acceptable alternative. Plus, with this capability, any app that becomes available for iPhone or Android phones, would immediately be available through the infotainment system...

And by scaling the image on the much larger touchscreen, that should make accessing those features much easier...

Rather than implementing the long promised Tesla App Store and/or adding an Android emulator, I'd rather having the screen mirroring feature - and have full access to the much larger smartphone's app library - and immediate access to any new apps developed for it - than being constrained with what could be developed for the Model S.