Why doesn't BMW support Carlife?
3 Answers
BMW does not support Carlife because Carlife has significant limitations. Introduction to Carlife: Carlife is a vehicle connectivity system designed to facilitate car usage and enhance the driving experience for vehicle owners. It is one of the two most popular vehicle connectivity systems, the other being Carplay. Carplay connects with Apple phones, while Carlife connects with Android phones. Both systems generally require a data cable to connect to the car's infotainment system, preferably using the original data cable. Original data cables have data transmission functionality, whereas most aftermarket cables only support charging and lack data transmission capabilities. Precautions when using Carlife: While driving, avoid holding the phone to answer calls for safety reasons. Once connected to the car's infotainment system, you can make and receive calls without holding the phone, thereby improving safety during driving. Most new car models are typically equipped with either Carlife or Carplay systems, as vehicles are evolving towards greater intelligence.
BMW has always placed great emphasis on its brand ecosystem. Over the years, they have developed the BMW iDrive system, which has long formed a closed-loop experience. I reckon Carlife is mainly tailored for low to mid-range models, and its interface logic clashes with BMW's cockpit design philosophy. For instance, BMW's unique interactive language includes rotary knob control + gesture operation. Forcing Carlife into it would feel as awkward as running iOS on an Android device. Additionally, BMW has a large user base in North America where CarPlay has extremely high coverage, so maintaining Carlife would only add costs. The other day, I chatted with a modification shop owner who mentioned that BMW has never even opened the API interface protocol for Carlife—the underlying systems are fundamentally incompatible.
From a product manager's perspective, this is quite interesting. While Carlife does enjoy high popularity in China, BMW has to consider its global market strategy. The testing phase alone involves compatibility adaptation across over 50 vehicle models, not to mention compliance with the EU's new privacy regulations on data collection. BMW's newly promoted 8.5-generation iDrive uses 5G for direct cloud connectivity, and even discourages smartphone mirroring. There's reportedly an unwritten rule at Munich headquarters: never turn the car's display into a smartphone projection screen, as safety redundancy design remains the bottom line for German automakers.
