The Coolest, Most Useful Apple CarPlay Ultra Features
The next generation of Apple CarPlay is packed with useful and cool functionality.
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Apple CarPlay has just received the biggest update in its 11-year history, and it’s called CarPlay Ultra. No longer stuck on your center infotainment screen, CarPlay Ultra can take over your instrument cluster and operate most of your car’s major functions.
We got a hands-on demonstration of what Apple CarPlay Ultra is capable of in a 2025 Aston Martin DBX, but it will look nearly the same in any car you own, borrow, or rent no matter how many screens there are, the size or shape of those displays, or what kind of physical controls are installed. These are the coolest new features we found.
Apple Gauges
With Ultra enabled, your digital instrument cluster gets a new, Apple-certified look. There are multiple gauge styles ranging from more traditional to hypermodern. You can also customize the colors and background wallpaper from a list sure to grow in the future.
Certain gauge screens also incorporate widgets, covering everything from Apple Maps to tire pressures, trip information, driver aids, and even things like calendars and weather forecasts. You can also make Apple Maps full screen.
Climate Control
Hate backing out of CarPlay to change climate controls? With Ultra, that’s no longer a problem. Now CarPlay can control your vehicle’s climate system. Temperature controls are always available in the dock on the sides of the screen or at the bottom. Tapping on them can bring up shortcuts to climate settings.
For more substantial changes, tap on the new Climate app that appears in CarPlay. From there, you can change any climate control setting anywhere in the car, all without leaving CarPlay.
Radio Control
Switching back and forth between the car’s built-in software and CarPlay to change radio stations is blessedly gone. Tap the new Radio app, and you can control any audio function such as changing terrestrial or satellite stations and adjusting the equalizer, all in CarPlay. All the physical buttons and knobs still work, too, if you prefer those.
Widgets
Love the widgets on your iPhone? Good news, you can get them in CarPlay now, too. Keep swiping right on your infotainment screen while using CarPlay Ultra (they’re not available in standard CarPlay), and you’ll get to the widgets screen.
The two columns can be swiped up and down separately so you can pick which two widgets you want to see. At launch, they include clocks, calendars, weather, and reminders, but more will be added in the future.
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New Layout
Depending on what the automaker chooses, you might get a new CarPlay layout. For more than a decade, recently used apps have been stacked in a column on the left side of the screen. Now there’s a new layout available that will look familiar if you’ve used a Mac or driven a Tesla. The recent apps, along with the climate controls, can move to a new dock along the bottom of the screen. With more space, there are now four recent apps instead of the usual three.
Siri Does More
Now that CarPlay can control most of your vehicle functions, Siri can, too. Siri can’t quite control everything you’ll find in CarPlay Ultra, but it can handle plenty of simple tasks like changing the temperature or radio station.
Unfortunately, Siri doesn’t know what car it’s in, so it can’t check the owner’s manual for you, but Apple says you can ask Siri to ask ChatGPT for answers to questions about your car.
Which Cars Have Apple CarPlay Ultra?
The first brand to get Apple CarPlay Ultra:
- Aston Martin
Coming Soon:
- Acura
- Audi
- Ford
- Genesis
- Honda
- Hyundai
- Infiniti
- Jaguar
- Kia
- Land Rover
- Lincoln
- Mercedes-Benz
- Nissan
- Polestar
- Porsche
- Renault
- Volvo
Were you one of those kids who taught themselves to identify cars at night by their headlights and taillights? I was. I was also one of those kids with a huge box of Hot Wheels and impressive collection of home-made Lego hot rods. I asked my parents for a Power Wheels Porsche 911 for Christmas for years, though the best I got was a pedal-powered tractor. I drove the wheels off it. I used to tell my friends I’d own a “slug bug” one day. When I was 15, my dad told me he would get me a car on the condition that I had to maintain it. He came back with a rough-around-the-edges 1967 Volkswagen Beetle he’d picked up for something like $600. I drove the wheels off that thing, too, even though it was only slightly faster than the tractor. When I got tired of chasing electrical gremlins (none of which were related to my bitchin’ self-installed stereo, thank you very much), I thought I’d move on to something more sensible. I bought a 1986 Pontiac Fiero GT and got my first speeding ticket in that car during the test drive. Not my first-ever ticket, mind you. That came behind the wheel of a Geo Metro hatchback I delivered pizza in during high school. I never planned to have this job. I was actually an aerospace engineering major in college, but calculus and I had a bad breakup. Considering how much better my English grades were than my calculus grades, I decided to stick to my strengths and write instead. When I made the switch, people kept asking me what I wanted to do with my life. I told them I’d like to write for a car magazine someday, not expecting it to actually happen. I figured I’d be in newspapers, maybe a magazine if I was lucky. Then this happened, which was slightly awkward because I grew up reading Car & Driver, but convenient since I don’t live in Michigan. Now I just try to make it through the day without adding any more names to the list of people who want to kill me and take my job.
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