TL;DR
- The new Android Auto music player UI appears to have been rolled back for some beta users.
- Users say the updated design broke steering wheel media controls in certain cars.
- While many liked the new look, most agree that pulling it makes sense until the bugs are fixed.
If your Android Auto music player suddenly looks a bit more boring, you’re not imagining it. Several users are reporting that the newer media player design, complete with the wavy progress bar and tweaked YouTube Music layout, has disappeared after briefly showing up in recent versions.
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The reports come from a Reddit thread where beta users noticed the older, flatter progress bar had returned, even though they were still running the Android Auto beta. A few commenters say the rollback likely wasn’t cosmetic, as the newer interface caused steering wheel media controls to stop working properly, including basic functions like track skipping and mute. This had been flagged elsewhere on Reddit.
The suspicion for these users is that their Android Auto was effectively downgraded in a recent update, bringing back the old look but also restoring full functionality. Most admitted they preferred the newer layout, particularly in apps like YouTube Music, where playback and shuffle controls were easier to reach. But the general consensus seems to be that, if it arrived with bugs serious enough to interfere with in-car controls, a rollback is the sensible move for now.
For now, there’s no official word from Google on the rollback. If the company pulled the updated media player to fix control-related issues, this probably isn’t the last we’ve seen of the wavy progress bar. However, it’s fair to say that in-car software has less room for error than a regular app update.
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