Following a Bloomberg report that revealed Apple was planning to offer ChatGPT, Claude, and other AIs support to CarPlay as soon as iOS 27, MacRumors says that the company is actually readying AI chatbots support for iOS 26.4. According to Apple’s CarPlay Developer Guide, chatbots will be supported in this upcoming software update, as Apple is opening the path for voice-based conversational apps. With iOS 26.4, developers will be able to add up to four action buttons in their apps, and include leading and trailing navigation bar buttons.
They won’t be able to implement a wake up word for those apps, which means you can’t just say “Hey, ChatGPT” while driving. However, it will still be possible to implement Siri Shortcuts to make it easier to go from Siri to your preferred chatbot.
While Apple is offering this improvement with the upcoming iOS 26.4 update, it’ll all depend on the developers to implement support for voice-based conversations on CarPlay with those apps, which will likely come sooner rather than later. It’s important to note that unlike Bloomberg’s previous report, Apple seems to be allowing third-party chatbots before it introduces its new revamped Siri, even though that could change in the upcoming iOS betas.
Apple still has big plans for Siri in CarPlay
Siri is expected to be powered by Google’s Gemini models in 2026, and reports suggest a full chatbot experience is coming later this year with iOS 27. Apple will likely try to take advantage of these new capabilities to lure customers away from the current chatbot apps they already use, including ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and Grok.
After all, the company’s main priority with iOS 27 is to deliver the Siri experience the company promised a couple of years ago. According to Bloomberg, Apple wants to bring World Knowledge Answers to Siri, enhancing the personal assistant’s current capabilities. Besides that, Apple touts its Apple Intelligence platform as built with privacy in mind.
With the new Siri allegedly being able to tap into your personal information, from the Health app to Messages and more, this means users would be able to have conversations with the personal assistant without worrying about this information being sold to third-party vendors. We still have to wait for Apple to announce how this new Siri will actually work in the near future, Bloomberg says that AI chatbots won’t be able to replace the “Hey Siri” or “Siri” commands from CarPlay, as Apple will continue to prioritize its own personal assistant.
iOS 26.4 has another key function in store for Apple CarPlay users
In addition to third-party AI chatbots being in the works for iOS 26.4, Apple is also planning to add video support in CarPlay. This feature was originally announced after the WWDC 2025 keynote, and it will let developers add video AirPlay capabilities to their apps. With that, users will be able to stream Netflix, Disney+, Amazon Prime Video, and others to the infotainment display when the vehicle is parked.
More interestingly than that, Apple is also working to add the Apple TV app to CarPlay, showing how serious the company is about this new feature. While it’s unclear if other streaming services will also add their apps or just AirPlay support, this is a big step forward to CarPlay users, as this has been one of their top requests for CarPlay over the years.
While Apple won’t let people drive and watch content, this at least makes it easier for those waiting in the car to spend some time by watching their favorite shows and movies. Especially now with Tesla being rumored to add CarPlay support, and Apple pushing the new CarPlay Ultra experience, this means the company knows more drivers have been using better infotainment displays, which also brings an improved video experience in those screens. That said, it seems iOS 26.4 is going to be yet another big update for CarPlay users, as it will unlock long-awaited functionalities.
