Car infotainment systems suck. Using the touchscreen in a modern vehicle usually feels more like interacting with an ATM or a stubborn inkjet printer than using a well-designed, consumer-focused product. These crude, emotionless operating systems might feel right at home on an industrial factory robot, but in the wider world—where people are used to smartphone OSes that are continually refined—these barely designed systems fall flat.

Infotainment systems are actually the worst part of a modern car. In fact, a study by Nielsen and SBD Consultancy found the systems in new cars to be the biggest cause of customer complaints. Much like during the beginnings of the modern smartphone, the car infotainment trend takes a bunch of manufacturers that traditionally have only made hardware and asks them to create software. It should be no surprise that they are terrible at it. (And that says nothing of their typical sloth-ish product cycles .)

Smartphone companies are coming to save car infotainment, though. Google and Apple are both working to bring their market-leading smartphone OSes to the car, which will finally bring large app ecosystems, decent voice recognition, smooth scrolling and animations, and beautiful design to your car's dashboard. By combining the strengths of the smartphone with car hardware, the hope is for an easier, safer, and more user-friendly way to do your car computing needs on the go.

Recently, we got a firsthand look at one of these—Android Auto, Google's foray into the car infotainment system space. The app has actually been available since March, but it took a while to find a phone running Lollipop or higher (the easy part) and a compatible car (not so much).

Table of Contents

The basics

Ron Amadeo

Ron Amadeo

Ron Amadeo

Ron Amadeo

Ron Amadeo

Ron Amadeo

Ron Amadeo

Ron Amadeo

Android Auto Samsung becomes only the second OEM to support Android Auto Wireless

Android Auto’s biggest upgrade ever is finally rolling out

Android Auto gets a big UI revamp

The Volvo Polestar 2 is the first Google Android car

Android Auto finally gets Waze integration—in beta, at least View more stories Android Auto is a "projected" interface (Apple's Car Play is too). It runs on an Android phone and is beamed to the car screen. The car screen is just a remote display, and everything—the interface, processing, and apps—runs on the user's Android phone, which is hardwired into the car via a USB cable. Android Auto isn't an operating system and isn't open source. This is a set of proprietary apps that live on your phone and are beamed over to your car's infotainment system. To launch Android Auto, you plug in a phone and tap the "Android Auto" app icon in the stock infotainment system.

Android Auto's interface is built from the ground up specifically for a car's dashboard. Google worked with government agencies like the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to design an interface that follows the best safety practices for computing while driving. The result is a UI that doesn't inherit (in the technical sense) anything from the phone version of Android. It includes larger touch targets, bigger text designed for "glanceability," a focus on voice commands, and overall a greatly simplified interface.

Still, Android Auto is laid out a lot like regular Android. A status bar sits at the top of the screen, which shows the phone's Wi-Fi or cellular reception, battery level, and time. A Navigation bar sits at the bottom, but the standard system-wide Android functions like Back, Home, and Recent Apps have been removed. Instead, the navigation bar lists actual "apps" in the Android Auto Interfaces—from left to right, they're Google Maps, Phone, Overview, Media, and Car. There is no app drawer, settings, or pull-down notification panel. There are also two big features that don't have navigation bar icons—Voice Search and Messages.

Overview is the "home screen" of Android Auto. It's basically a combination of your notifications and a very limited subset of Google Now cards.

is the "home screen" of Android Auto. It's basically a combination of your notifications and a very limited subset of Google Now cards. Google Maps is exactly what you'd expect: best-in-class, always up-to-date maps and navigation with spoken directions and a searchable POI database.

is exactly what you'd expect: best-in-class, always up-to-date maps and navigation with spoken directions and a searchable POI database. Phone is contacts, a dialer, and call logs from your phone.

is contacts, a dialer, and call logs from your phone. Media is, by default, just Google Play Music, but third-party apps can be installed, allowing this icon to switch to music from other services, podcasts, or whatever other audio source someone feels like building.

is, by default, just Google Play Music, but third-party apps can be installed, allowing this icon to switch to music from other services, podcasts, or whatever other audio source someone feels like building. Car is the last icon, a little speedometer. Right now it only lets you exit Android Auto and return to the stock infotainment system. Our experimenting with developer mode leads us to believe this will eventually be a place for OEM-specific apps. Right now it's just a single exit button.

is the last icon, a little speedometer. Right now it only lets you exit Android Auto and return to the stock infotainment system. Our experimenting with developer mode leads us to believe this will eventually be a place for OEM-specific apps. Right now it's just a single exit button. Voice Search is an overlay available on any screen via the top-right microphone button or a steering wheel button. It's a lot like the voice search you would get on the Android or iOS Google app—tell it to navigate to an address, call a contact, or ask it a question like "How tall is One World Trade Center?" or "When does Home Depot close?"

is an overlay available on any screen via the top-right microphone button or a steering wheel button. It's a lot like the voice search you would get on the Android or iOS Google app—tell it to navigate to an address, call a contact, or ask it a question like "How tall is One World Trade Center?" or "When does Home Depot close?" Messages don't have a screen to call home, but they'll pop up as notifications and hang around as cards on the overview screen. There is never text for messages. You can tap on them and have them read to you and you can reply by voice. By default Messages is Google Hangouts chats and SMS, but you can install third-party apps for messages from other services.

We mentioned that you can install third-party apps for Media and Messages, but that is all you are allowed to install. Android Auto only supports these two types of third-party apps, and app developers cannot even make their own UIs. They can only plug in to Google's built-in Music or Message interface. This means the bullet points you see above are the entirety of Android Auto's functionality.

On the left side of the screen there will sometimes be a scrollbar with tappable up and down arrows. It feels really unnecessary on our touchscreen-equipped Hyundai Sonata, but not every Android Auto vehicle will necessarily have a touchscreen—a D-Pad or rotary controls are also options. Android Auto also integrates with the car's hardware in a few other ways. It can work with a few steering wheel buttons and gets access to some of the car's sensors.

Where Android Auto really shines is the design and user interface. Material Design is in full effect here, with bold colors and cards aplenty. There is even a dark-themed "night mode" that automatically kicks in at sunset. The navigation bar at the bottom means you can get to every function of Android Auto in a single click—a big improvement over the stock system, which usually requires two-to-three taps to get anywhere (Hit back/home, then the app drawer, then the app). Everything is laid out logically: the "do things now" buttons are all front and center, and more complicated actions are available in the navigation drawer. While scrolling on the stock infotainment system is a slideshow to the point that it's occasionally disorienting, on Android Auto it is a (relatively) smooth process. Overall it's a wonderful application of the smartphone design ethos to the lifeless, clunky infotainment system.

Listing image by Ron Amadeo