**Can You Utilize Apple CarPlay With Several Phones?**
Hitting the open road with CarPlay on your vehicle’s infotainment system proves quite beneficial for handling a range of iPhone tasks while ensuring your driving remains distraction-free. It’s an excellent ally for daily commutes, but during long road trips with several passengers, it can become a bit tricky depending on who wants to manage the system.
Although you can have multiple devices connected to a vehicle’s infotainment system, only one can have an active CarPlay connection at any given time. The infotainment system will probably remember every device that pairs with it, but only one can be utilized at once. To switch between devices, you must use the infotainment’s settings menu or have an iPhone forget the vehicle to perform this task.
If you aim to connect multiple phones for purposes like sharing music, keep in mind that popular streaming services now typically offer a solution. For instance, collaborative playlists on Apple Music or a Spotify Jam session can help alleviate the need for device switching by allowing group playlists and queues.
**How to Connect and Change Devices with Apple CarPlay**
While CarPlay serves well for numerous functions — and includes some significantly underrated features — managing multiple devices can be cumbersome. Switching between devices becomes essential if you plan to use several phones, so let’s quickly review how to add an iPhone to CarPlay.
Here are the general steps:
1. First, start the vehicle and confirm that Siri is activated on your iPhone. Your vehicle should also have wireless connections enabled, if possible.
2. From the iPhone, go to the Settings Menu.
3. Tap General, then choose CarPlay.
4. Pick the vehicle from the available list.
5. Activate the vehicle’s voice control, which will subsequently enable CarPlay.
If your vehicle features a USB connection for CarPlay, simply connect the iPhone to the USB port. Some vehicle models might label the USB port with an icon for ease of use. To switch between devices, the specific settings will largely depend on the type of infotainment system you possess.
The steps will resemble the following:
1. Access your infotainment’s Settings menu.
2. Search for a section titled Connected Devices or List of Smartphones.
3. Choose the device you want to connect.
You can also have an iPhone forget a CarPlay-enabled vehicle. Just navigate to Settings > General > CarPlay on your iPhone, select the vehicle listed under My Cars, and then tap Forget This Car on the subsequent screen. Another iPhone will then be able to connect to the vehicle.
