Stereos
Apple CarPlay Retrofit NZ: Adding It to an Older Car
Your car works fine. The stereo does not. It plays radio, maybe a CD, and connects to your phone over a Bluetooth link that drops every time you go under a bridge. Meanwhile every new car has Apple CarPlay or Android Auto as standard.
The good news: you can retrofit it to almost any vehicle. Here is what is involved.
What CarPlay and Android Auto actually give you
Both do the same core thing: they put a simplified version of your phone on the car’s screen, controlled by touch or voice, with the interface designed so you can use it without taking your attention off the road.
In practice that means:
- Navigation on the dash using Google Maps, Waze or Apple Maps, with live traffic, instead of your phone slipping off the passenger seat
- Messages read aloud and replied to by voice, so your phone stays in your pocket
- Spotify, podcasts and calls on a screen you can actually see, rather than a four-line monochrome display
The safety argument is the real one. Every one of those things is something people currently do by picking up their phone.
Wireless or wired?
Wired means plugging a cable in every trip. Reliable, charges your phone, and never drops.
Wireless connects automatically when you start the car. Nothing to plug in, which sounds minor until you have lived with it. The trade-off is that your phone is not charging unless you plug it in separately, and wireless connection uses more battery.
Most people who have used both prefer wireless for short trips and wired for long ones. Units that support both give you the choice. Our Atlia AT-501CP handles wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto.
Will it fit my car?
Three things determine this.
The aperture
Older vehicles use standardised single DIN or double DIN openings, and a new unit drops straight in with a facia adapter. Many newer vehicles use a moulded dash where the screen is integrated into the trim, which needs a vehicle-specific facia kit to look factory rather than aftermarket.
Steering wheel controls
If your volume and track buttons are on the wheel, you want to keep them. This needs a control interface that translates the car’s signals into something the new head unit understands. It is a standard part of a good install, but it is a part that gets skipped on cheap ones, and then your wheel buttons are dead.
Everything else wired into the factory stereo
On modern vehicles the head unit is often carrying more than audio: parking sensor chimes, factory reversing camera, climate display, amplifier control. Replacing it means retaining those functions through an integration module. This is the part that separates a clean retrofit from one where your parking sensors stopped beeping.
The Atlia head unit range
We build our own head units under the Atlia name:
- Atlia AT-501CP — wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, the straightforward upgrade
- Atlia AT-509CP — 9-inch screen with 4GB RAM and 64GB storage, for people who want the interface to stay quick
- Atlia AT-9508CP — 9-inch touchscreen with CarPlay and Android Auto, reverse camera input and steering wheel control compatibility, sold as a stereo and installation combo
That last one is worth calling out: it is priced as a package with the fitting included, which removes the guesswork about what the total comes to.
Do it at the same time as anything else
If you are also thinking about a reversing camera, do it in the same visit. The head unit is already out and the dash is already apart. Splitting the jobs means paying to take the same trim off twice.
Getting it fitted
Touchstone Automotive retrofits CarPlay and Android Auto head units at our Auckland workshop, including facia adapters, steering wheel control retention, and reversing camera integration.
Tell us your make, model and year, and whether you have controls on the wheel or a factory camera, and we will tell you exactly what your vehicle needs.
