Google has recently been changing a lot in its flagship applications, including Android Auto. The maps have recently gained not only new functions, but also completely new colors, and it looks like this is just the beginning of bigger changes.
Material UI are changes that appeared in Android a few years ago, and are now joined by a new color scheme – Material You. It seems that it will apply to all applications from Google’s offer, including Android Auto, which is changing more and more often. Whether it is for the better is, as usual, a very debatable issue. It will probably be similar this time, because in Android Auto 13.4 there is a completely new look for the music playing application, which, let’s be honest, is not very beautiful.
Google is getting ready for something bigger
Not everyone realizes this, but Google is very restrictive in the case of Android Auto when it comes to the appearance of applications on the screen. Each of them, from navigation to the music player, must be similar to each other. That is, the basic elements of the interface must be in almost the same places so that users can easily get used to them. There is nothing worse than a driver trying to navigate the layout of a completely new application while driving. That’s why in media players we have buttons such as start/stop or next/previous track in the same places. And that’s why the latest changes apply to all applications, i.e. Spotify, YouTube Music, etc.
As you can see in the image from 9to5Google, the player screen in Spotify will change its appearance significantly. Now it seems quite empty and simple, because previously the cover of the currently playing piece was much larger. Currently, it has been moved to the left side, and next to it we have the artist, title, time and progress bar. Underneath there is room for basic buttons, which are in more or less the same places. In addition, we also have a completely new font that will probably appear in all applications in the future. The new design seems more ascetic and requires some getting used to. You must also remember that the screen may look slightly different depending on the screen format you have in your car.
There are many indications that this change is dictated by Google’s preparations to support car radios. As we have written several times, there are more and more clues in the Android Auto code that herald the introduction of a new function. The ability to operate terrestrial radio stations from the Google application will certainly be an important and welcome change. Perhaps the unification of the design is intended to better prepare it to operate the radio tuner. We will probably find out about this only in a few months, when the function actually starts working.
source: 9to5Google
Source: antyweb.pl
