New CarPlay App Is Alive!

MBCook · Feb 18, 2026

I got an update to the app today and when I got in my car sure enough the screen is no longer blank!

Nothing too fancy, but nice.

Ford Mustang Mach-E New CarPlay App Is Alive! IMG_6681

Ford Mustang Mach-E New CarPlay App Is Alive! IMG_6682

DanMachE · Feb 18, 2026

In my opinion, if this lets them add features faster and more reliably... its actually a genius way of worrying about old hardware on the car side.

A major downside I see though, is it should be open to both operating systems not just android or apple.

Hope this is a good omen!

MBCook · Feb 18, 2026

I have no experience on the Android side, but I think in the past there have been things that rolled out on iOS first and then came to Android a few days later.

At the moment they’re not missing much. Everything here is basically somewhere else in the infotainment system anyway. People were speculating about how they could add preconditioning, this could certainly be a place.

I don’t see why Ford wouldn’t make an equivalent version for Android Auto.

Maui · Feb 18, 2026

Moving the duplicated stuff out of the "car" ui and into the "app" ui would reduce redundancy and allow them to move faster. But then you are requiring people to have a phone and use CarPlay.

so not sure where they are going and at this point it looks like just more to maintain.

CraigS · Feb 18, 2026

They are also requiring Apple to keep CarPlay compatible with older cars. In 10 years I expect to be driving the same car and I don’t want an upgraded iOS to mean it won’t connect to CarPlay v1. If they are going to only have features in apps then they should sell a phone with the car and label it a remote control like with TVs.

dan_meh · Feb 18, 2026

Maui said:
Moving the duplicated stuff out of the "car" ui and into the "app" ui would reduce redundancy and allow them to move faster. But then you are requiring people to have a phone and use CarPlay.

I would like to see the data for “number of Mach E owners without a smartphone” I suspect it rounds to zero. Ford could just make things "complementary" in the same way as lock/unlock, for example.

To be clear: I'm not taking a maximalist position. I wouldn't want to control my heated seats through the phone, for example. And I'm aware of the trade-offs. If functions move into the phone app, I can't just toss my keys to a friend and say "take my car to Florida." My friend would need the ford app, I'd have to grant them access... it would kind of be a mess.

And yet, Consider...
As the owner of a 2024, I can't see charge rates on the screen when I'm sitting at a charger. It's in my phone but not on the giant center screen. If Ford can just use phone projection to inexpensively report the charging speeds on my center screen, that's a win! Yes, the trade off is that I can't glance in the window while I'm on a call outside the car, for example.

I do want Ford to fix it properly in Sync, but I don't want great be the enemy of good.

MBCook · Feb 18, 2026

If you’re the kind of person who doesn’t want a smart phone, I can’t see you buying a Mach-E. That just doesn’t make sense to me.

It 100% needs to work without a phone. If you lose yours or the battery is dead and you don’t have time to charge it or something you need to be able to use your car.

In a weird way this seems like a bit of a toe-dip test at what CarPlay ultra allows auto makers to do. They can add their own UI inside the CarPlay environment to see things or add controls (if they do that). Ford explicitly said they’re not interested in CarPlay ultra. It would never come to our existing vehicles anyway.

I’m interested to see what they do in the future. I’m certainly left a little baffled about the app’s future and why it exists.

The first screen I think could use some reworking just because there’s so little information on so much space. The second screen seems pretty nice to me and it would be really nice to add a few more things like maybe the 12 V and HVB health. There’s certainly space on the right hand side.

Kamuelaflyer · Feb 18, 2026

MBCook said:
If you lose yours or the battery is dead and you don’t have time to charge it or something you need to be able to use your car.

You can. It came with a fob. They work fine even when the fob battery is dead. In addition you can enter the car with a door code alone. Finally you can even start the car without your PAAK phone and without a fob by using a backup start code. There’s no excuse for being locked out or unable to start solely due to a dead phone or no fob.

MBCook said:
Ford explicitly said they’re not interested in CarPlay ultra

They’ve said no such thing. What they actually said was they’re not interested in generation 1 of CarPlay Ultra due to how it takes over the car’s UI. They explicitly left open adopting it for future Ultra iterations.

Mache_Nor · Feb 19, 2026

Gimme a big, fat «precondition now» button within this interface and I will be very happy! I’m old enough to drink, have kids and pay my taxes, I’m sure Im mentally capable of using this functionality without burning up myself and my family.

Misterrobot · Feb 19, 2026

Pictures himself as Tevye yelling from the roof "Preconditiooooon - Precondition. . . . . Precondition!!!" @Ford Motor Company

azerik · Feb 19, 2026

Gimme precondition button and my drive logs back.

silverelan · Feb 19, 2026

dan_meh said:
And yet, Consider...
As the owner of a 2024, I can't see charge rates on the screen when I'm sitting at a charger. It's in my phone but not on the giant center screen. If Ford can just use phone projection to inexpensively report the charging speeds on my center screen, that's a win! Yes, the trade off is that I can't glance in the window while I'm on a call outside the car, for example.

I’ve been saying it for awhile now, it’s just downright bizarre that Ford won’t allow Ford app to mirror on the center screen to show the charge rate.

MBCook · Feb 19, 2026

silverelan said:
I’ve been saying it for awhile now, it’s just downright bizarre that Ford won’t allow Ford app to mirror on the center screen to show the charge rate.

That would a good one. Better charge info.

silverelan · Feb 19, 2026

azerik said:
Gimme precondition button and my drive logs back.

Sadly, I think the 21-24 cars have their complete feature set and Ford won’t devote any further development resources into enabling new functionalities or features.

matwlev · Feb 19, 2026

Mache_Nor said:
Gimme a big, fat «precondition now» button within this interface and I will be very happy! I’m old enough to drink, have kids and pay my taxes, I’m sure Im mentally capable of using this functionality without burning up myself and my family.

Heck, I'd even take a medium or small precondition button! I'd even be happy with just a "precondition upon arrival" button that would automatically decide if it's needed and make sure things are preconditioned for a specific destination or waypoint. That way I don't have to worry about the charger being in the system. I don't really want to have to worry about figuring out when the best time to hit the button would be.

New CarPlay App Is Alive!

MBCook

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DanMachE

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MBCook

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Maui

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CraigS

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