For him most of people, carplay It is essential. Apple’s in-car experience provides an infotainment experience far superior to most options from automakers. There’s quick access to your favorite apps, Siri integration, seamless connectivity, and more.
Here are all my favorite tips and tricks to make sure you’re getting the most out of your CarPlay experience…
Customize your CarPlay apps and home screen
Many of your favorite apps are probably available on CarPlay, but that doesn’t mean you want all on the CarPlay home screen. Fortunately, it’s easy to adjust those options.
- Open the Settings app on your iPhone
- Tap “General”
- Tap “CarPlay”
- Tap your car name and choose “Personalize”
Here you will see a complete list of all the CarPlay apps on your phone. You can simply tap the red minus sign to hide apps from appearing in CarPlay.
You can also rearrange the CarPlay home screen while on this page of the Settings app. Simply drag the apps to the desired order using the three lines on the right side of the app icons.
carplay wallpapers
While you can’t use any photos as your CarPlay wallpaper, Apple offers a selection of pre-installed options.
- Open the Settings app in CarPlay
- Select “Wallpaper”
- Choose the wallpaper you want and tap “Set”
Apple add new wallpaper options to CarPlay from time to time, but there are still only a limited number of options available.
Wireless or wired?
CarPlay works both wired and wireless, depending on the make and model of your car. Wired CarPlay generally provides a faster and more reliable experience. While using wireless CarPlay, you may experience some latency when doing things like changing songs and accessing Siri.
Here is my strategy:
- I use wireless CarPlay for quick trips around town when I get in and out of the car multiple times while running errands.
- I use wired CarPlay for longer road trips where I’m in the car for extended periods.
Again, your mileage may vary depending on your car. However, there are ways to bring wireless CarPlay to any car. My personal recommendation is the CarlinKit 5.0 adapterthat turns your car’s wired CarPlay implementation into a wireless experience for less than $60.
dark mode
CarPlay is available in light mode and dark mode interfaces. In the Settings app via CarPlay, you can choose from three options:
- Light
- Dark
- Automatic
I use the automatic setting, which switches between light and dark modes depending on the time of day and other outdoor lighting factors.
Driving focus mode
One of the most important benefits of CarPlay is that it improves safety in the car by discouraging you from picking up your phone. First, there’s Driving Focus mode. This blocks notifications, messages and incoming calls so you can focus on the road.
You can customize Driving Focus mode through the Settings app on your iPhone. You can choose to allow notifications from specific contacts and enable an auto-reply feature that tells people who text you that you’re driving. You can also choose to enable Driving Focus when connected to CarPlay automatically.
Announce messages
Announcing Messages is a popular iPhone feature that works with Siri to read your messages aloud. You can then choose to reply to that message using your voice. The feature works with Apple’s Messages app, as well as third-party apps like WhatsApp.
- Go to Settings > Siri & Search > Announce Notifications on your iPhone
- Turn on Announce Notifications and select compatible apps
- In CarPlay, make sure Announce messages with Siri is enabled in the CarPlay Settings app
SharePlay
If you’re like me, you prefer to be in control of your music while driving. However, if you want other people in your car to be able to contribute songs to the queue, CarPlay has you covered.
You’ll see a SharePlay icon in the top right corner of the Apple Music Now Playing screen. By tapping this icon, you will be prompted to generate a QR code that others can scan. Once they scan this QR code, a pop-up window will appear informing you that someone is interested in joining your SharePlay session.
Once that person joins, other people can contribute songs to the queue, see what’s currently playing, and rearrange the queue, even if they don’t have Apple Music.
With CarPlay in iOS 26, Apple added support for widgets for the first time. Now you can access many of your favorite iPhone widgets right on your car screen.
The implementation here will vary depending on the size of your car’s screen. On some cars, you can create two “stacks” of widgets, while other cars limit you to a single stack.
To manage widgets in CarPlay, follow these steps:
- Open the Settings app.
- Choose General.
- Choose CarPlay.
- Tap “Widgets”
Here you can add multiple widgets to your stack and reorder them. There is also an option called “Smart Rotation” that will intelligently switch between widgets in each stack, as well as a “Widget Suggestions” option.
Live activities
iOS 26 also adds support for live activities in CarPlay. This mirrors live activities appearing on your iPhone directly on the CarPlay screen. Live Activities are one of my favorite iPhone features, so I’m glad they made the jump to CarPlay with iOS 26.
Live Activities are enabled by default in CarPlay, but you can turn them off by going to the Settings app on the CarPlay screen.
Pinned messages
iOS 26 revamps the Messages app in CarPlay, including support for pinned messages to the top. This, however, has proven to be a controversial change. With iOS 26.2, Apple added the option to disable pinned conversations in Messages in CarPlay.
Simply open the Settings app on the CarPlay screen and then turn off “Pinned Messages.”
icon tinting
If you’re looking to upgrade your CarPlay interface, there are several appearance modes: Default, Dark, and Light. You can find these options in the Settings app in CarPlay.
Wrap
Are you a CarPlay user? If so, what are some of your favorite tips and tricks? Let us know in the comments.
My favorite CarPlay accessories
Follow opportunity: Rags, blue sky, instagramand Mastodon.
FTC: We use automatic affiliate links that generate income. Further.
