[mbeezy13]

Hi all,

Trying to sort this out. wife's new xdrive50e is a great car, but for some reason it keeps having problems connecting to her iPhone. Every 3-4 days i have to go remove the phone from the car, hard reset the infotainment, then re-pair the phone and CarPlay will work again.

She has the latest software for the infotainment (idrive 8 i believe). we have only had the car a few weeks and this is becoming a weekly thing i have to do for her.

Is this a common problem? It will work fine for several days, then out of nowhere just stop being able to connect to the phone until it's removed and re-paired. And you can't re-pair it without a hard reset...the process just doesn't work until that is done.

Is there a way to just use wired CarPlay instead? Seems like that would be more reliable.

[Vuelos]

Well, this appears to be a trend. I've had the same issue with wireless Apple CarPlay as well - for the last 2+ weeks since I took delivery.

Internet searches show that it was happening 2-3 years ago a lot, and most of them found that it was a problem with iOS or CarPlay. I have trouble believing that, considering we have another 2022 X3 that doesn't have the same connectivity problems.

[nZtiZia]

for CarPlay to connect, one must enable both wifi and Bluetooth on the iPhone. my wifi is always on, but I turn on Bluetooth before entering my vehicle. with this, I have near 100% connection rate.

once the “handshake” is done, the wifi connection between the vehicle and iPhone will become a background connection (wifi icon turns grey and looks like it was turned off but it’s not), while the Bluetooth icon remains blue. if either of these are off, the iPhone won’t establish a CarPlay connection with the vehicle. I find when both are on prior to entering the vehicle, it yields a high connection rate

[VikesX5]

I started another thread on this topic as my x5 50e with 8.5 not only disconnects car play but also has issues with Hey BMW and Hey Siri. It will work if I hit the mic for both however not by just speaking. Siri depends if CarPlay is actually connected. 8.5 is buggy as there have been other quirks as well like unable to switch to full electric at times or things freeze up randomly when too much is going.

[mbeezy13]

Originally Posted by VikesX5

I started another thread on this topic as my x5 50e with 8.5 not only disconnects car play but also has issues with Hey BMW and Hey Siri. It will work if I hit the mic for both however not by just speaking. Siri depends if CarPlay is actually connected. 8.5 is buggy as there have been other quirks as well like unable to switch to full electric at times or things freeze up randomly when too much is going.

are future updates past 8.5 going to be OTA?

[VikesX5]

Originally Posted by mbeezy13

are future updates past 8.5 going to be OTA?

I would hope 9.0 is after the response on some of the quirky 8.5 but I have no background on OTA updates. I do know I have given up on making the speech section work. Tried 5 things today and nothing worked other than hard reset then it breaks again. I don’t think Siri and Hey BMW like each other

[TurtleBoy]

Originally Posted by mbeezy13

are future updates past 8.5 going to be OTA?

There are no plans for any updates after 8.5 for the G05 that will be the final major version.

[e61it]

My iphone connection has always been great until the last apple update. It regularly won't work now unless I forget the phone, and redo carplay connection. Hope there's a fix for this.

[mbeezy13]

Originally Posted by e61it

My iphone connection has always been great until the last apple update. It regularly won't work now unless I forget the phone, and redo carplay connection. Hope there's a fix for this.

Interesting, hopefully it's an Apple bug then. Since it doesn't seem like it would get fixed if it ends up being a BMW bug.

[nZtiZia]

Originally Posted by mbeezy13

Interesting, hopefully it's an Apple bug then. Since it doesn't seem like it would get fixed if it ends up being a BMW bug.

what iOS? my iPhone 14 Pro is on 16.6 without any connection issues in my 45e on 03/2023.50

[e61it]

I'm on 16.6 with iphone 12 pro. Also, there are times when setting out that I get a message telling me to login to MY BMW account when I am logged in. It sometimes sorts itself out after driving for a bit (all of a sudden sent destinations reappear and nav works) or there are times when it doesn't and then it's unpair and re-pair. The first two years the system was pretty flawless but since the last apple update not so.

[vishster]

I got my 2024 X5 50e last week and have been having similar issues with Carplay. Frequently when I start the car, I cannot get Carplay to start without a soft reset of the iDrive 8.5. Sometimes, it doesn't recognize Carplay immediately, but I can get it to connect from the Mobile devices menu. I have an iPhone 13 Pro Max on iOS 16.6. A soft reset by pressing the volume button does the trick most of the time, but it is annoying to have to be doing this a couple of times a week. I did not have any issues like this in my 2021 X7 which was on an earlier version of iDrive. Seems to me this is very much an 8.5 problem that needs to be fixed.

Edit: I meant soft reset of iDrive by pressing the volume button does the trick (not hard reset). I don’t have to repair the phone after the reset. I do keep Bluetooth and WiFi on all the time and do not use a VPN. It affects all iPhones paired with my 50e. CarPlay works fine with my other cars and previous BMW so I don’t think it’s an iPhone problem.

[Keyinhand]

Originally Posted by vishster

I got my 2024 X5 50e last week and have been having similar issues with Carplay. Frequently when I start the car, I cannot get Carplay to start without a hard reset of the iDrive 8.5. Sometimes, it doesn't recognize Carplay immediately, but I can get it to connect from the Mobile devices menu. I have an iPhone 13 Pro Max on iOS 16.6. A hard reset by pressing the volume button does the trick most of the time, but it is annoying to have to be doing this a couple of times a week. I did not have any issues like this in my 2021 X7 which was on an earlier version of iDrive. Seems to me this is very much an 8.5 problem that needs to be fixed.

Agree on you with being an 8.5 issue: my CarPlay hasn’t worked right in my 2024 X6 40i since I had the update (done to fix an emergency call malfunction error) last week. That problem went away, and while the phone will connect via Bluetooth, CarPlay won’t work at all. Haven’t tried the hard reset yet, as unpairing the phone and deleting didn’t work when I tried that today.

[Sabanism]

I'm having similar issues.

Phone: iPhone 14, iOS 16.6
Car: June production X5 xDrive40i

Took delivery 7/29/2023. On 7/31/2023 the right screen went blank and I had a message in the left screen that said the emergency call service was inactive. I took the car back to the dealership, and they "fixed" it with a software update. I think I got an update from 8.0 to 8.5 because the software I have now is very different from what was shown to me when I took delivery.

I've had to hard reset the system twice since then. This morning I deleted the phone from the car, then deleted the bluetooth connection from the phone and the wifi connection from the phone, then re-paired the phone. If it stops working again I'm going to make another service appointment.

[darryls]

Same issue for me with iOS - on two different phones (each running different versions of iOS). Requires the infotainment system be rebooted then it works well for 2 days before it requires another reboot. I did not notice this with v8...only since 8.5.

[Tallcane]

I am having this issue as well. I am an early August build. It strangely recognizes Airplay for a few days and then all of a sudden it forgets it. And, then starts recognizing it again a day or two later.

[nZtiZia]

are y’all consistently ensuring both wifi and bluetooth are on (enabled and blue in the Control Center) when you’re in your vehicle? if not, then this points to user error, not the vehicle. (not saying it isn’t the vehicle, though…)

[couchgate]

Just picked up a 50e, 8/10 build date with ID 8.5. I've noticed that CarPlay won't work after the car is locked (and sleeps). Get an error on the iDrive screen that CarPlay can't connect and to check WiFi and Bluetooth settings on the phone. A hard reset of ID fixes it instantly. Hopefully an Apple bug and not BMW!

EDIT: one more thing to note is that when I reset ID, I don't have to delete/re-pair CarPlay. Just starts working almost instantly.

[Sabanism]

Originally Posted by nZtiZia

are y’all consistently ensuring both wifi and bluetooth are on (enabled and blue in the Control Center) when you’re in your vehicle? if not, then this points to user error, not the vehicle. (not saying it isn’t the vehicle, though…)

Good thought, but I always keep WiFi and Bluetooth enabled.

I use a VPN on my phone, and wondered if that might have been the problem. Going to turn it off to see if it helps.

Sorry if this is a hijack, but have also noticed that I have to turn volume way up to listen to music through Carplay. I just tested, and I had to set the volume to around 75% to get the same volume with Spotify through Carplay as I did through the native BMW app at about 30%.

[couchgate]

Originally Posted by Sabanism

Good thought, but I always keep WiFi and Bluetooth enabled.

I use a VPN on my phone, and wondered if that might have been the problem. Going to turn it off to see if it helps.

Sorry if this is a hijack, but have also noticed that I have to turn volume way up to listen to music through Carplay. I just tested, and I had to set the volume to around 75% to get the same volume with Spotify through Carplay as I did through the native BMW app at about 30%.

Good point - I've had the Microsoft Defender VPN enabled on the phone for work. Will give it a try to see if keeping that disabled helps with CarPlay.

[nZtiZia]

Originally Posted by couchgate

Good point - I've had the Microsoft Defender VPN enabled on the phone for work. Will give it a try to see if keeping that disabled helps with CarPlay.

any improvement after disabling the VPN?

[couchgate]

Originally Posted by nZtiZia

any improvement after disabling the VPN?

So far yes actually - probably will require a few more days of wake/sleep cycles to confirm. But ever since I disabled the VPN I've had no problems connecting to CarPlay.