Hi everyone. I'm a longtime owner of a 2011 R57 and I've started looking for a replacement. I'm only looking at 2-3 year old cars with low mileage. I found one and fell in love. It's the right color, has the right interior and everything else. Only issue is that I had decided "my next car will have Apple Car Play!" We are an all-Apple family from day one. Well this car, which is 500 miles away by the way, does not have Apple Car Play. It does have Mini Connected. It's a 2018 model.

My question is, can we upgrade to Apple Car Play? Or does Mini Connected pretty much do everything I need/want (music and nav, mostly)? I would like to play Spotify through the radio.

My current car is base model all the way, except it does have heated seats and some stripes we added. No navigation. My spouse's car is a 2015 Nissan with a horribly outdated navigation system.

So would I be wrong to not pursue this car? Is it an easy fix if we wanted to add Apple functionality to it? Or is Apple Car Play overrated and shouldn't be so high on my list of priorities?

I appreciate any info or advice!

 

Never used Apple Car Play. Wifes current car has both that and Android Auto. Why MINI refuses to offer both is astoundingly stupid. Previous car wife had was a 2016 MINI and the built in Nav was awful, much slower than just using the I phone she had at the time.

You can add Car Play, several vendors offer such devices assuming your car is equipped with the correct display. My F56S has the basic display so I can't easily upgrade it. I just use my phone and it connects to my added Digital Sound Processor via Bluetooth and I get Waze or Google map directions easily.

I'd say if the car has everything you want/need at the right price you should go for it and then just do upgrades as needed.

 

I have a 2017 F54 Clubman and was told by the MINI dealer that it was built 2 months prior to CarPlay being available. It had the larger touch screen... but no CarPlay. I ended up getting a SW upgrade from a 3rd party BMW specialist in the UK that enabled CarPlay. It was simply installing 2 files via a USB key.

But i find I still use MINI Connected 95% of the time. CarPlay doesn’t take advantage of the HUD which is very noticeable using NAV.

You can have a hybrid mode where you run both - using CarPlay for audio and MINI Connected for NAV. But I rarely use that. I prefer the look of MINI Connected while driving - it’s quite subjective but I think it’s a more seamless experience with the rest of the car.

MINI Connected is far from perfect. But it’s still light years ahead of other in car systems of other brands.

 

You’ve probably made your decision by now but here is my $.02.
My wife’s 2019 Outback has CarPlay. I use it in her car. It’s nice. I loved it when we first got it, but 7 months in, it’s not the game changer it was in December.

My 2019 base F55 has the base stereo and I dont find anything lacking in how I use my phone for waze, google maps for directions, Spotify for music, or the podcast app I prefer. They all work fine on the subi screen with CarPlay, and just as fine only my iPhone in my Mini with the cravenspeed mount.
So, for the $3000 upgrade it would have been for my Mini, it was money well saved.

 

Bummertech should be able to help you figure out if it has CarPlay, if it’s CarPlay upgradable, etc. Just call them with the VIN.

I love CarPlay. My 2014 BMW doesn’t have it, so I bought a box from Bimmertech which adds CarPlay. It cost about $500 without installation, which I did myself.

Bluetooth navigation with the the phone works well, but I moved to a new area BMW’s 8-inch screen with CarPlay is great. I did originally wired it so that the phone is in the console between the seats. This degraded GPS performance too much, so I’m trying to come up with a better wired location.