Ever tried to force a square peg in a round hole? That’s more or less what connecting Android Auto to something like a new Mini or a recent Cadillac results in. Not for much longer, though. On Tuesday, Google announced a major Android Auto update—that’s the smartphone-mirroring function, not the native operating system—and it seems to be the fix for weirdly-shaped screens.
For better or worse, the idea that screens must be rectangular is well and truly dead. From BMW’s latest six-sided screen to Mini’s circle to Mercedes-Benz’s dashboard-wide drive-thru menu, car infotainment screens are getting properly strange. I’ll admit, some of the silhouettes are cool in a “Remember when tech was still fun?” way, but trying to display a rectangular maps window on them always leads to compromise.
The solution? Going full-bleed. This year, Android Auto is expanding beyond the boundaries of a typical window, and the result looks pretty good. Maps that properly fill screens, no wasted space. A big ‘take that!’ in the face of Apple CarPlay, which is still a sub-optimal experience on say, Mini’s cluttered round screen. Plus, Google Maps is getting an update that shows overpasses and buildings in 3D. Far out.
Of course, maps that fit aren’t the only upgrade on display here. Since Apple CarPlay added customizable home screen widgets, it only makes sense that Google’s hot on Apple’s heels in the smartphone mirroring race. Right off the rip, the latest Android Auto press pack shows a photo widget, a phone automation widget, and a weather widget. Handy if you have the top down or the sunroof open and are looking to stay ahead of the next rainfall. At the same time, YouTube joins the party for video streaming when you’re parked, and it can pick up audio streaming of video podcasts and such when you’re on the move. Handy for say, dull EV fast charging sessions. BMW, Ford, Genesis, Hyundai, Kia, Mercedes-Benz, and Volvo will be the first to get it in our neck of the woods, and given how all those brands offer EVs, the YouTube integration makes sense.
However, not all is well with the latest Android Auto update. You know Gemini, Google’s AI assistant that wants to edit your emails in a way that doesn’t sound like you and occasionally gives you wildly incorrect summaries of your Google searches? Yep, that’s expanding in Android Auto in a big way. As Google claims, “if your phone has Gemini Intelligence, you’ll be able to access it in Android Auto later this year. With Gemini Intelligence, your device understands your context, anticipates your needs, and gets things done on your behalf.”
Does it? Does it really? Or does it simply make you want to throw the device you’re using into the sun? The use cases for Gemini Intelligence in the car that Google cited are combing through your files to send a friend an address you can voice-to-text them in five seconds anyway, and ordering Doordash from your car. It’s not like you could, I don’t know, swing by the restaurant and order take-out since you’re already on the move.
Still, full-width maps that fit strangely-shaped screens are a worthy addition for this era of deeply entrenched automotive tech bloat. It also signals “your move” to Apple, and this sort of competition for user-friendliness is generally a good thing for everyone.
Top graphic image: Google
I was behind someone in the left turn lane at a green light when the car in front of me wasn’t moving. They eventually pulled out and drove off. I was following another car that suddenly stopped in the middle of a narrow road. After 10 seconds they slowly (5mph?) proceeded up the street until approaching the intersection, then drove off at normal speeds.
Obviously, these were situations where people are a slave to Nav, and not thinking at all about just pulling over until they were ready to “drive” their car safely.
In short, we can’t really fathom what drivers think that they need in a car’s nav system.
Forget the screens :
Who’s Jennifer Travis, and what is her message?
Looks like she also goes by Chloe.
That 6-sided screen that leans to the left is an abomination. Everyone who worked on and OK’d that idiocy should be blacklisted from the industry.
It’s from BMW, no surprise.
If you want the rectangular screen, they’re happy to sell you a subscription for that.
Sounds like this has to be implemented by the OEM.
My Giulia had a wiiiiiide screen, but AA would only use half of it, with the other half just displaying an “AA” logo. This was hard coded into the infotainment software and there was nothing Google could do about it. So if you’re expecting the AA update to improve the screen on your three year old car, probably not gonna happen.
I’m kind of confused because Android Auto on the Chinesium head unit in my Jag already has a weather widget.
Hopefully they fix the colourways that they currently use for google maps in AA. I have it set to top down view, fixed north orientation and you can’t even see half of the streets anymore because the lines are too faint to see, or are not shown at all.
If you turn it to 3D, follow the direction of the car mode, it’s infinitely easier to see what is around, but I prefer the other way.
My AA recently got an update and changed my original pleasant British woman voice to an awful British woman voice they have packaged in Gemini. It was like going from Elizabeth Hurley to Tracey Ullman as that witch in Robin Hood Men In Tights
I spend about a third of my work time in my car, Gemini has issues but being able to get better info while driving, or have it look up something I hear in an audiobook and give me a Wikipedia summary has been fantastic. Also, while not perfect yet, being able to say ‘when’s my next appointment’ and then ‘drive there’ is great.
It’s the most obvious solution and I genuinely appreciate them not trying to reinvent the wheel here. Hopefully a future iteration can move homescreen elements to make better use of the space.
those displays look horribly cluttered.
It’s a feature. You look at the screen trying to interpret what you are seeing when *BAM* you crash your car and need to buy a new one. Planned obsolescence is so last century. Having a bad quarter? Send an OTA update to scramble the screen data and your CEO bonus is assured.
I’d be furious if that idiotic notification from Chloe led me to miss the next exit because I couldn’t see it.
Maps should be completely devoid of distractions if they have screen focus.
They didn’t actually fix the square peg round hole problem, they just made the peg transparent so you can see the round hole better. The peg is still unbendingly square!
The BMW’s display is big enough that it doesn’t matter, and the driver’s side diagonal corner is used for the car’s native controls anyways; it begrudgingly gets a pass. The Lucid is probably the biggest improvement since it was already using most of the usable space. But the Mini? If the before mockup is correct, they’ve actually made things *worse* by squeezing all the map/navigation UI inwards due to the placement of the HVAC controls. Would it really have killed them to use any of the 30% of screenspace they’re wasting?
Counterpoint: that image of the Mini screen is idiotically godawful. The left and right outer quarters of the screen are useless while the center half is cluttered all to hell. The way the column of buttons at the upper left of the central area actually in use hasn’t been adapted to move further left and open up the center is half-assed.
The left and right quarters are only useless map bleed of whatever is half a mile to the right or left of you. Who cares. Move the buttons there, or make it possible to put the widgets out there.
Ole Gemini has infected my AA and I can’t say it’s any better or worse at interpreting my voice commands but its responses have gotten far more long-winded. The old assistant would just spit out the information but Gem tries to be more conversational.
I hate it.
It’s horrible! But you can turn it off in your AA settings on your phone, I found out. Worth it. Gemini doesn’t understand commands like Assistant does.
This is good to know – my AA just switched and it’s irritating. I fully expect that in 6 months they’ll kill off the option and force me into Gemini, though.
Or the next update will just keep switching it back. I don’t mind if they release upgrades and improvements but when they roll out something new that doesn’t at the very least have the same functionality as it used to before it’s infuriating.
I remember once my wife accidentally hit the summarise option while driving and it turned an innocuous text of mine into one that outwardly said I was annoyed with her. Much laughter was had.
When approaching a roundabout, I’m told by nav to “proceed into the roundabout and take the second right exit”. So, continue straight?
Maybe that’s appropriate for a larger roundabout, but that is too much translating when I’m concentrating on, you know, driving and the traffic and pedestrians around me?
Then again, nav thinks that turning around on a divided highway is described as “taking a slight left”. No, it’s taking a u-turn through the divider.
This is not an issue we have with standardized sized and shaped screens.
I’d apologize to the GM focus group that suggested that it would be better with a 5% taller and 3% narrower screen, but they’re stupid and should be given guardrails.
Does GM serve alcohol to their focus groups?
Will it show Facebook Messenger messages again? It stopped awhile back and my Star Wars group uses FM chats to pass last minute details about our events like where to park, what door to use, etc. Would be real handy to have that again while I’m driving to an event.
I tend to not use the android auto simply because even though I have a tall screen to use in my vehicle, they cannot for some reason fully emulate my same shaped phone screen. the maps cut off weird things too. factory Nav sadly works better in the car, where you need the map.
just rotate your phone
Has Steve Jobs epic proclamation “You’re holding it wrong” finally come to fruition?
I’m the new Steve Jobs, except I’m not as rich and not nearly as much of an asshole
I don’t want the screen on the dash to be square, just emulate my phone screen 100% and then it would be worth it. No things hanging off the dash to hold the phone and full functions.
Update dropped just in time for my Tetris Z shaped screen. Time to rotate it endlessly before it falls all the way down and ruins my game.
Maybe I didn’t spend enough time with it, but when we were test driving cars I absolutely hated Mini’s round screen. Conceptually yes, it fits their design language since BMW has owned them, and it’s at least different from the pack. But it’s different just to be different, not better.
As a former Mini owner, different just to be different has always been the case to an extent. The circular central area, whether screen or speedo, has never been a great use of space or a smart ergonomic decision. It’s especially interesting considering the cars are created by the logical and rational Germans these days. That said, no matter how contrived the character may be sometimes, I do think we need more companies daring to be different and whimsical for no reason.
But, do they have a fix that lets you turn off the police reported ahead alert? I think that’s what we really want
Why? Are you a cop? You have to answer if your a cop.
I think we all know by now that every shape goes in…that’s right, the square hole.
Screens should be in Academy Standard as the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences intended. They have science in the name, it must be correct.
I have very little experience with Android Auto as my new car is the first to offer it. I used it to navigate somewhere since Toyota paywalled the integrated navigation. Beyond that, I’m not sure what I’ll use it for. I shoved all my music on a USB drive and stuck it in the one and only data enabled USB-C port offered.
I don’t hate this in principle. I semi-regularly order takeout on my way home, and since I’ve had bad luck with “schedule later” features in most restaurant’s order pages, I don’t like to submit the order until I’m the right distance from the restaurant. In theory, being able to tell my phone to submit the order while I’m driving wouldn’t be terrible.
That said, I expect if I actually tried this it would do something like submit to the wrong restaurant because I was closer to it as the crow flies.
I wish Android Auto kept the Moto Assist feature option that would announce when you got a text message, ask you if wanted to hear it, and give you the option to reply without every looking at or touching the screen.
Moto was a better manager than AA has ever been.
I miss mybold Motorola phone at times because this is incredibly true. It’s a shame AA is everything these days.
Ugh, more solutions to problems that were created by solutions to problems that nobody had.
Spot on. You know what has a screen that works great with nav apps (and every other app), never has problems with connecting to the car, and works in any car right back to an 1890 Benz? My phone.
And it does it with a rectangular screen! Forsooth!
I was going to comment that the solution to screen problems is less screens.
But I think you said it more eloquently.
Every problem was once a solution to a previous problem.
The only screen you should be paying your attention too is the one with the wipers! This is all craziness, and now we have the stupid ADAS things because something else is distracting the drivers attention.