CarPlay was released exactly 10 years ago

Can you believe it? It has already been 10 years since CarPlay was released at the Geneva International Auto Show! The first cars were of Ferrari, Mercedes-Benz, and Volvo (the announcement was actually them announcing their new cars that featured CarPlay (Volvo's is linked here)), but now almost every car out there has it (except for Tesla, Rivian, and since last year GM-owned car brands like Chevrolet). Apple was building up to CarPlay for a whole decade before its release, with car support for iPods started in 2003-4 and the industry standard not many years later, with extended features announced in 2010 and not long after it was adopted by 25 cars and finally usability of iPhone apps owned by the A-Class-Mercedes-Benz-sporting user by voice in the car. It was announced a year before at WWDC13, then named "iOS in the Car" (a video of the announcement is linked here), with the release called by some the biggest Apple product release since the iPad, and many that couldn't wait to see how CarPlay might bring a totally new UI for a car's system of infotainment. Exactly what was this "iOS in the Car" brought some good guesses, including that it might just be like an iPhone app but with more features (speaking of apps, people also wondered whether Apple would reduce access for the API for developing CarPlay apps or would let any developer that developed for iOS develop for CarPlay, and Apple did the second choice while making devs get approval to develop for CarPlay). The previewed version was different from the version that shipped, though. The feature made a driver able to plug their iPhone into their car's console jack and get access to many features of iOS on their car's central touchscreen, with some 3rd-party audio-focused apps (specifically iHeartRadio, Stitcher, Spotify and Beats Music (Pandora, at that time a big iTunes competitor, wasn't part of the original launch, but a year later it came) available as well as the 1st-party apps. Apple got some help from QNX Software Systems (which also makes car infotainment systems) in distributing CarPlay. At announcement through now, Apple took CarPlay (or iOS in the Car) very seriously, saying that it was a "key focus for us", both because of the vast amount of time spent in a car and (when it was announced) increasing sales of cars. Big improvements of CarPlay included 2019's allowance of multiple windows, the allowance of CarPlay on the instrument cluster screen, and 2022's expansion to fit cars more natively (it's only in Aston Martin and Porsche cars for now).

Sources: Cult of Mac (https://www.cultofmac.com/847785/carplay-launch-2014/)

By Leo