Car infotainment systems are hit-and-miss at best. Some companies nail this, while others suck at it. The worst examples involve terrible navigation systems, small screens with awful touch responsiveness, and inexcusably bad voice recognition software. It feels like a lot of cars focus on how the car works and drives, then throw in the infotainment tech without a second thought.
To be fair, we can see why they’d do that – it’s better to have a great car with bad infotainment than the other way around. Regardless, it’s still annoying when the infotainment system doesn’t do what you need it to do. Keeping that in mind, here are some great tech upgrades you can install in your car for better infotainment:
iPad Holders
Let’s be honest, the majority of car touchscreens suck. They’re either unresponsive, not big enough, or too big. It shouldn’t be hard to make a screen that looks nice and works well – especially when there are hundreds of tablets out there with this technology already!
On that note, you can ignore your annoying screen and get an iPad holder for car usage instead. This lets you mount your iPad on your dash and use the screen for things like navigation or music. You get a much bigger screen to look at, as well as one that’s more responsive and less likely to cause a crash because you keep tapping it multiple times.
HUD Projectors
Some expensive modern cars are built with a heads-up display that projects onto the windscreen ahead of the driver. It’s a cool bit of tech, but it also helps to improve safety by keeping your eyes on the road rather than looking at a screen. Annoyingly, you only see this tech in high-spec luxury cars that cost a fortune, so yours might not have it.
Thankfully, you can get your hands on HUD projectors that connect to your car and sit ahead of your steering wheel. They project a display onto your windscreen so you can see things like your speed, traffic sign warnings, etc. Some of the better ones may even integrate navigation so you can see directions. It’s an awesome way to upgrade your infotainment without splashing the cash.
Wireless CarPlay Adaptor
If your car doesn’t come with Apple CarPlay or Android Auto, then you’re in trouble. You’re stuck using the car’s built-in infotainment voice control system, which usually works about as well as you expect. The car fails to register what you’re saying and leaves you red-faced.
Counter this by purchasing adaptors for CarPlay or Android Auto! They plug into your car and let you control things by talking to Siri or Alexa. It’s a much better way of using voice activation in your vehicle so you don’t have to tap or click buttons on a screen the whole time.
Modern infotainment systems are a lot better than they were, but some are still way below par. These gadgets give your car a nice tech boost while ensuring you aren’t distracted by a terrible infotainment system.