CarPlay and BMW Bluetooth Connection Issues

The window wipers creak as I press the engine start button. Some frost had formed on the windshield. Winter is early this year. I look at the center console, expecting the Apple CarPlay interface to pop-up as it usually does.

But it doesn’t.

I fiddle around in the interface and try clicking on the Media menu entry in the BMW iDrive interface. No dice. My finger hovers over the ‘1’ button on the shortcut strip under the media display and hits it firmly. Still nothing.

The BMW iX3 CarPlay Mystery#

It seems the car completely forgot about the CarPlay connection that had been working flawlessly for my last 2 years with this BMW iX3.

I’m not the only one with this issue, and neither the cause nor the fix was clear from the outset.

Nick O’Leary’s helpful video FIX iOS 26 Apple CarPlay Issues! | 14 THINGS TO TRY! gave me a nice start, but none of the options worked for me.

I tried all the options except factory resetting my iPhone. This is always a pain, especially when I wasn’t sure it would fix the issue.

The BMW iDrive “Soft Reset” Fix#

Some suggested going for the nuclear option of a full iDrive factory reset, but I’m happy to report that a lighter-touch option is available. It’s non-destructive and did the trick for me.

Here are the steps I followed:

Step 1: On your iPhone, go to Bluetooth settings and “forget” the car.

Step 2: In the car interface, do the same: go to the devices panel and remove the iPhone.

Step 3: Perform the reboot or “soft reset”.

• Look for the physical audio mute button on your center console
• Press and hold it until the media display turns off and KEEP IT PRESSED
• Until the media display comes back on, now let go.

Step 4: Pair your phone via CarPlay with your car

• In the car interface: If your steering wheel has a microphone button, press and hold it until the device pairing screen appears
• On the phone: Navigate to the CarPlay settings screen

Here’s BMW’s official documentation about the reboot procedure. The instructions vary slightly depending on the car’s BMW iDrive version.

It is still unclear to me what happened. No updates were applied to the car or the phone right before CarPlay started failing.

“Turning it off and on again” to the rescue, yet again, I guess…