Apple is giving CarPlay two audio upgrades that drivers have been asking for. With iOS 27, a new MiniPlayer stays visible on screen, while a scrubber lets you jump to different parts of a song or podcast.
The changes make audio controls easier to reach without opening the full Now Playing screen. They’re small additions, but they should make CarPlay feel more convenient when you’re behind the wheel.
A Smarter Way to Control Playback
Until now, CarPlay audio apps showed a waveform icon in the top-right corner that users could tap to jump to the Now Playing screen.
iOS 27 replaces that icon with a MiniPlayer, which displays album or podcast artwork alongside play/pause and skip controls.
The practical result is that drivers can manage playback without navigating away from whichever part of the app they’re browsing, whether that’s a playlist, podcast library, or station list.
The second addition is audio scrubbing. iPhone users have long been able to drag a playhead to jump to a specific point in a song, podcast, or audiobook, but CarPlay has never supported that.
In iOS 27, the playhead on the Now Playing screen is larger and responds to touch-drag input, letting drivers or passengers quickly seek through content without repeatedly tapping forward or backward.
Which Apps Benefit
Both features are built into Apple’s own CarPlay apps, including Apple Music and Apple Podcasts, and should extend to third-party audio apps once developers update for iOS 27.
That covers widely used apps like Spotify and Overcast, though those improvements depend on each developer’s update timeline. Audio apps are among the most frequently used category in CarPlay, ranking behind only navigation.
For anyone who regularly listens to long-form content like podcasts or audiobooks on commutes, scrubbing support in particular closes a gap that has existed in CarPlay since the platform launched.
Finding a specific moment in a two-hour episode has required stopping and restarting or tapping a skip button dozens of times. The new playhead eliminates that friction.
These two audio changes are part of a wider set of CarPlay updates arriving in iOS 27. Apple has not announced a public release date for iOS 27 beyond the developer and public beta phases currently underway, though the software is expected to ship this fall alongside new iPhone hardware.
