Poll: Should Rivian offer Apple CarPlay?

[Rizzian]

Not offering CarPlay in 2024 is like opening a Chinese restaurant in western Kentucky and telling Meemaw and PopPop that if they don't figure out how to work the chop sticks, they're gonna leave hungry because there's a strict "no forks" rule in this joint.

I joke, but it's true.
Rivian is choosing to alienate people. Maybe those people are Luddites. Maybe they value their freedom of choice or are just practical. I'm fine with Rivain filling a specific niche or staying "on brand" but perhaps they shouldn't try to push people away before they achieve profitability.
If you really want Rivan to include CarPlay, it won't be because people that they already sold cars to want it. You need to push an agenda that makes them look bad. What about all of the handicapped people who rely on their phones because of limited mobility or some other sort of deficiency? Pretty ballsy move for RJ to leave them out in the cold.
Reminds me of this one restaurant ...Absolutely no forks given.

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[SwampNut]

Guess which direction will cost them more in development costs and maintenance? The home grown way.

I have had a long career in tech, software, startups, and development. There is a common falacy that "we can do it better and cheaper."

<Narrator voice>
It took three times as long and double the cost.

There is also the "not invented here" syndrome which definitely infects Tesla and their narcissistic five year old in charge.

 

[SwampNut]

...Absolutely no forks given.

You're forkin' kidding me. But I have been in a place like that.

 

[sub]

I concede that not everyone agrees with me that what Rivian has is better than Android, Auto and Carplay. And I want to agree with those who say what Rivian and people who don't want to use it wouldn't have to use it. I agree with the logic. There should be no fear of adding it as an option for those who want to use it.

But there is at least one example of a fabulous infotainment setup that does not have carplay or Android auto. Tesla. And I have never seen a car with Carplay and Android Auto that had a native infotainment system that didn't suck when you were not using Carplay / Android Auto.

So I am afraid that if Rivian added Carplay and Android Auto it would make everything else worse. And not using it would not actually be an option.

So I'm voting NO, don't add it.

 

[djsider2]

There is at least one example of a fabulous infotainment setup that does not have carplay or Android auto. Tesla.

Tesla still doesn't have the depth of apps that a system like Carplay and AA would have. A new startup company can get their app into the Carplay and AA environments. They'll probably never see the light at Tesla, Rivian, native infotainment systems until they gain a huge marketshare.

But I have never seen a car with Carplay and Android Auto that had a native infotainment system that didn't suck when you were not using Carplay / Android Auto.

Audi has a great one when they had nvidia chips in the car. Your normal rental from Avis has a bare bone system. It's not Carplay or AA that's the issue. It's the car's hardware specs. It's like running Windows on a chromebook vs professional developer laptop. Guess which one will work better, but also costed more.

Everyone that argues Rivian is doing it right needs to convince Rivian to actually put up the resources to further this infotainment system. (Spotify profiles per driver...) As of right now, they're putting minimal effort and have probably laid off a good chunk of the infotainment team in the last 2 years.

I prefer Rivian implement any app and services natively, but that takes a LOT of money to make and maintain. Why not offload to carplay and AA for the users that would prefer function over style?

 

[djsider2]

I can see your point. We have CP in our Rav4 Prime and the only thing I use on it is WAZE. It would be nice to have APPLE MAPS or Google Maps, and a native PODCAST app, but that is wishful thinking.

I would guess that most drivers when hooked up use one of the map programs.

Native would be nice. There's just no money there for it when the company is still trying to get profitable.

 

[Captain JB]

in my opinion, the two main mistakes (in a startup there will always be some small mistakes) are not having a full size spare in a advertised adventure company and vehicle and not having car play. It is by far a superior tool than miss A which works 30% of the time and even when it does, has far fewer tools to help enhance the safety of the drive and its enjoyment. Let’s get car play. JB

 

[Chewy734]

Right because developing your own phone interface, Spotify, Amazon Music, etc etc is easier. I just do not agree with this sentiment at all. And do we really think $14 a month is going to cover the cost for all of this, doubtful.

My son's Hyundai doesn't have Nav and just basic radio/XM. Everything is done through Carplay/AA. They didn't waste their efforts on thing that the majority of people don't use.

Well, I never said that. Of course the alternative has development and maintenance time/money involved as well (maybe even more than just adding CarPlay).

But, the folks making the decisions have decided it’s worth that effort to keep ownership of their infotainment system and not have to rely as much on Apple. I suspect it was more of a business decision than a software-implementation one.

 

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

CarPlay? Couldn't care less. Android Auto? ?

 

[Volfan615]

Could care less about Car Play or Android Auto. It really screws up the entire UI.

 

[Sgt Beavis]

The software team at Rivian has spent 3+ years designing one of the best, and most good looking, in-car software packages. Why mess it up with CarPlay?

They should be able to implement everything that CarPlay offers as a native option in the future. Just be patient. It took Tesla forever to add all the additional features…

Give me Waze or give me dea,,, ummm, speeding tickets. Yea, that's it.
I'll be happy if they get the text integration working and Apple Music (I know it's coming) but really I NEED Waze. It's no longer a big deal though.

 

[SoCal Rob]

I do appreciate you thinking outside the box on a possible pay-to-play option. While I think it would be worth exploring, I think that may just cause more outrage like it did with BMW when they tried that (from what I understand, I've never owned a BMW). It certainly would at least satisfy the needs of the most ardent CarPlay/AA supporters while making it more in Rivian's interest as well (and hopefully keep Rivian's incentives aligned to continue to build their own UI for all the people who choose not to subscribe). So maybe there is something to that.

I'm sorry if I mischaracterized you. You're right, I don't know you.

I just grow tired of the same old "you shouldn't care if Rivian adds CarPlay, you just don't have to use it if you don't want to" attitude here and elsewhere, and it sounded like that's what you were rolling with in your comment (with an extra dose of blaming CarPlay detractors for lacking empathy, which admittedly irritated me). If that's not the case and you're open minded enough to see "our" side of things as well instead of just instant dismissal of other's viewpoints (which I think we can both agree is a HUGE problem in our culture at the moment, along the lines of your point about empathy), then maybe we see more eye-to-eye then I originally thought.

I honestly don't have a problem with people wanting CarPlay. It's a totally rational position based on what an individual's personal preferences and priorities are. But it just seems like a good portion of the CarPlay crowd (and again, I'm sorry if I mischaracterized you) doesn't seem to want to try to understand why some of us actively DON'T want it added because adding it would very likely go against OUR personal preferences and priorities.

First and most importantly, THANK YOU for engaging in a discussion about this. I think this is becoming a lost art and our society is worse off because of that. I appreciate someone helping me understand their point of view because that’s the only way to develop solutions to problems which approach satisfactory for all. We may never agree, and that’s okay. Rivian has the final say, however it plays out.

I tend to be both realistic and optimistic. There are things I realistically expect tech to do for us, like remind us about things the system manages: service is due soon, credit card on file is expiring soon, you’ll be dropping your car off for service tomorrow, etc. The optimist in me wants to go beyond that: service is due soon do you want me to submit a ticket for you?, credit card on file is expiring soon so update to prevent service interruptions and here is a QR code you can use to take you to the Rivian page to do that, you’ll be dropping your car off for service tomorrow, don’t forget to remove personal items from your vehicle which you’ll need while it’s in service and do you want me to set the service center as your destination in navigation?

If I get the things which I think are realistic then I’m happy and if I get the things which are the stretch goals of an optimist then I am delighted. With that in mind, to me the current Rivian infotainment is lacking in some areas that the overwhelming majority of consumers realistically consider bare necessities: hands-free texting and USB audio. Then there are a bunch of things that I’d place in the optimistic / stretch goal category because Rivian started building app functionality into the infotainment: Waze, Google Maps, Apple Maps, Gaia GPS, OnX, Apple Music, Teams audio, ABRP, PlugShare, etc. In these threads, there are typically people writing that they don’t care about screen projection but they just want (choose from one of the above). This seems silly to me because when you add up all of those wants the conclusion is that overall, people want screen projection. I say that because there will never be an army of external coders developing for a Rivian-specific platform when the installed base is a pittance compared to either of the two main smartphone operating systems.

I fully expect Rivian to deliver hands-free texting eventually, and I’m not sure about USB audio. Based on my own needs, the functionality of the Rivian infotainment is just good enough when everything is working properly and the UI is better than average. So I’m not jumping up and down demanding screen projection, but I know that Rivian will not be able to keep up with the stretch goal apps, and increasingly demanding consumers, unless something changes so they don‘t have to do in-house development for all the things people want today, and will want in the future.

You raise a good point about the furor BMW created, but there is a crucial difference between what they did and what Rivian can do. BMW was giving it away for free and THEN changed course to start charging for it. BMW customers saw no value in something which was already being given away for free so they didn’t want to pay the new cost. Rivian, on the other hand, could truthfully say that they are charging for screen projection because it will incur development costs they neither anticipated nor included, and if people want it added then they need to pay for development and maintenance of the code.

Of course people counter this with the idea that people won’t pay for it because other manufacturers give it away for free. However, paying more to get more is not a foreign concept to consumers when there is value associated with the additional cost. Look at the cost difference between regular tickets to a performance and VIP tickets to a performance: the basics (performance content) are the same yet some people are willing to pay more for amenities which makes the performance better for them. Back in the automotive arena, there was a decent stretch of time where premium brands were charging for Bluetooth phone audio support when less expensive brands were including it for free. Many buyers of premium cars saw value in it so they paid for it.

In the spirit of continuing to offer solutions rather than just arguing:
I don’t use Android, but if Rivian charged us a fee to install a subset of Android apps (Waze, Google Maps, Apple Maps, Gaia GPS, OnX, Apple Music, Teams audio, ABRP, PlugShare, etc.) which are appropriate for use while driving with a simplified interface, vetted as compatible with the underlying Rivian OS, and run natively for a seamless experience then that would work for me! I suspect that this would be more complex than supporting Android Auto and CarPlay and charging for the privilege but if Rivian is serious about wanting to retain control over the UX then this is a way to provide apps consumers want without needing internal development for each and every app.

I think the conversation about screen projection has evolved, yet I still haven’t heard an objection to it which cannot be addressed except for one: Rivian doesn’t want to. I think the best argument against that is that they aren’t listening to what their current and potential customers want, which can impact sales. So a lot of people are doing what they can to make sure that decision-makers at Rivian know there is demand and it is NOT going away. It’s the only lever to pull, so we shouldn’t be surprised that people are continuing to pull it.

Sorry for the novel-length post.

 

[KidThunder]

I actually don't like carplay myself - I don't need the texting that bad when I'm driving anyway and I find it frustrating that it locks me out of using my phone when needed.

For instance, I was recently traveling and rented a vehicle with carplay. We were exploring a new country so while we had a route plugged in, we still wanted to occasionally move the map around, zoom, etc. But carplay locks the phone to just displaying the written directions. So we would have to unplug/replug in all the time. Also we missed a turn when the text notification popped up over a critical part of the driving directions.

So I am not bummed at all that it's missing from the Rivian ecosystem. I don't find it to be as convenient as 50% of the folks on here.

 

[ActionableDave]

You raise a good point about the furor BMW created, but there is a crucial difference between what they did and what Rivian can do. BMW was giving it away for free and THEN changed course to start charging for it. BMW customers saw no value in something which was already being given away for free so they didn’t want to pay the new cost. Rivian, on the other hand, could truthfully say that they are charging for screen projection because it will incur development costs they neither anticipated nor included, and if people want it added then they need to pay for development and maintenance of the code.

I would pay for CarPlay/Android Auto to have the option. It isn't ideal, but neither is the current experience. It has gotten better over time, but there aren't enough homegrown options that work well enough to feel confident that things will get dramatically better using them any time soon.

In the spirit of continuing to offer solutions rather than just arguing:
I don’t use Android, but if Rivian charged us a fee to install a subset of Android apps (Waze, Google Maps, Apple Maps, Gaia GPS, OnX, Apple Music, Teams audio, ABRP, PlugShare, etc.) which are appropriate for use while driving with a simplified interface, vetted as compatible with the underlying Rivian OS, and run natively for a seamless experience then that would work for me! I suspect that this would be more complex than supporting Android Auto and CarPlay and charging for the privilege but if Rivian is serious about wanting to retain control over the UX then this is a way to provide apps consumers want without needing internal development for each and every app.

This is what I was expecting in the beginning; a Rivian app dev environment (based on Android) where apps can be written for all of the above mentioned plus maybe Pandora and SXM.

This seems like a better path to me than CarPlay/AA, but it also will likely require more resources to do. And I think this will be the option they provide before we see CarPlay or Android Auto.

Last thing: Since the option to have Android Auto wasn't included in the question, we have no way to know how many people want CP/AA because Android users may have answered literally.

 

[SoCal Rob]

I would pay for CarPlay/Android Auto to have the option. It isn't ideal, but neither is the current experience. It has gotten better over time, but there aren't enough homegrown options that work well enough to feel confident that things will get dramatically better using them any time soon.

This is what I was expecting in the beginning; a Rivian app dev environment (based on Android) where apps can be written for all of the above mentioned plus maybe Pandora and SXM.

This seems like a better path to me than CarPlay/AA, but it also will likely require more resources to do. And I think this will be the option they provide before we see CarPlay or Android Auto.

Last thing: Since the option to have Android Auto wasn't included in the question, we have no way to know how many people want CP/AA because Android users may have answered literally.

I agree on all counts. Also, in my first post in this thread:

First, I think the poll needs to be about optional screen projection (Android Auto and Apple CarPlay) and not CarPlay only.

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