Tesla has long been one of the few automakers not to offer Apple CarPlay support. We’ve heard a lot of rumors that CarPlay will eventually be added to Tesla’s car infotainment systems, but the Elon Musk-led company has yet to confirm that it will add support for it. Now, a Bloomberg reporter says Tesla is working with Apple to integrate CarPlay into its cars. However, Tesla and Apple still face some technical challenges to solve. Meanwhile, Apple is reportedly working on updating CarPlay to support third-party voice assistants.
What’s holding back Tesla CarPlay’s debut?
In this week’s Power On newsletter, Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman claimed that “Tesla continues to plan to add CarPlay so that it can run within a window of the current software interface. There are just a few hurdles that Tesla and Apple need to overcome.”
During testing, Tesla allegedly discovered “compatibility issues” between Apple Maps and the internal mapping system that powers its Autopilot feature. According to reports, Tesla’s native maps cannot sync properly with Apple Maps during autonomous driving.
This mismatch can create a confusing experience for drivers if the two apps are displayed side by side. To fix the problem, Tesla reportedly asked Apple to make engineering adjustments to the map. Apple complied, rolling out fixes in subsequent updates to iOS 26 and the latest version of Apple CarPlay.
“But here’s the thing: Adoption of iOS 26 has been slower than previous versions. Tesla believes that means too few users had the updated map changes by the end of last year,” Gurman said.
The reporter noticed that Apple recently shared the first usage data of iOS 26. The report stated that 74% of iPhone models released in the past four years have the system installed, while the adoption rate of iOS 18 in the same period last year was 76%. Apple has not yet specified how many users are running the newer version that includes the map fix, leaving some uncertainty about how quickly Tesla can progress.
It’s unclear when (or if) Tesla will launch support for Apple CarPlay. The company appears to be waiting for software adoption to rise further before proceeding with the rollout.
Meanwhile, Apple continues to bring new features to CarPlay. It adds support for third-party voice chatbot apps and expands its premium CarPlay Ultra tier.
