{"id":243500,"date":"2026-01-21T01:22:10","date_gmt":"2026-01-21T01:22:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/243500\/"},"modified":"2026-01-21T01:22:10","modified_gmt":"2026-01-21T01:22:10","slug":"android-auto-update-delivers-media-player-redesign-gallery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/243500\/","title":{"rendered":"Android Auto update delivers media player redesign [Gallery]"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t<img width=\"1600\" height=\"800\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/android-auto-gemini-3.jpg\" class=\"skip-lazy wp-post-image\" alt=\"\"  decoding=\"async\" fetchpriority=\"high\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Google is rolling out a redesign to the media player on Android Auto alongside the latest widely available updates.<\/p>\n<p>Android Auto 16.0 started rolling out to beta users <a href=\"https:\/\/9to5google.com\/2026\/01\/09\/android-auto-16-0-update-debuts-as-bug-breaks-message-replies-for-some\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">earlier this month,<\/a> but has more recently hit the stable track with version 16.0.660224. And, with this version, Google is also rolling out a redesign we\u2019ve been waiting some time for.<\/p>\n<p>First shown off officially <a href=\"https:\/\/9to5google.com\/2025\/05\/24\/android-auto-media-app-updates-google-io\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">back at Google I\/O 2025 last May<\/a>, Android Auto\u2019s media player has been preparing this new look for a while. The updated UI shows the play\/pause button in the bottom left corner, with track controls to the side, and further playback controls beyond that. This new layout definitely breaks some muscle memory, but it looks quite nice and improves the placement of playback controls.<\/p>\n<p>We\u2019re seeing the change in apps, including Spotify and Pocket Casts, with the former also showing some updated Material You theming to match the album art.<\/p>\n<p>\tAdvertisement &#8211; scroll for more content<\/p>\n<p>The altered layout also appears in the condensed dashboard view.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-wp-class--hide=\"state.isContentHidden\" data-wp-class--show=\"state.isContentVisible\" data-wp-init=\"callbacks.setButtonStyles\" data-wp-on--click=\"actions.showLightbox\" data-wp-on--load=\"callbacks.setButtonStyles\" data-wp-on-window--resize=\"callbacks.setButtonStyles\" height=\"1024\" width=\"1024\" data-id=\"701971\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/android-auto-new-media-player-3.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-701971\"  \/><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-wp-class--hide=\"state.isContentHidden\" data-wp-class--show=\"state.isContentVisible\" data-wp-init=\"callbacks.setButtonStyles\" data-wp-on--click=\"actions.showLightbox\" data-wp-on--load=\"callbacks.setButtonStyles\" data-wp-on-window--resize=\"callbacks.setButtonStyles\" height=\"1024\" width=\"1024\" data-id=\"701973\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/android-auto-new-media-player-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-701973\"  \/><\/p>\n<p>Let us know in the comments below if you\u2019re seeing this change!<\/p>\n<p>Beyond the media player redesign, there aren\u2019t any other notable user-facing changes in the latest Android Auto update. In a teardown, too, we didn\u2019t find any noteworthy changes. <\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-wp-class--hide=\"state.isContentHidden\" data-wp-class--show=\"state.isContentVisible\" data-wp-init=\"callbacks.setButtonStyles\" data-wp-on--click=\"actions.showLightbox\" data-wp-on--load=\"callbacks.setButtonStyles\" data-wp-on-window--resize=\"callbacks.setButtonStyles\" height=\"1024\" width=\"1024\" data-id=\"701974\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/android-auto-new-media-player-5.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-701974\"  \/><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-wp-class--hide=\"state.isContentHidden\" data-wp-class--show=\"state.isContentVisible\" data-wp-init=\"callbacks.setButtonStyles\" data-wp-on--click=\"actions.showLightbox\" data-wp-on--load=\"callbacks.setButtonStyles\" data-wp-on-window--resize=\"callbacks.setButtonStyles\" height=\"1024\" width=\"1024\" data-id=\"701975\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/android-auto-new-media-player-4.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-701975\"  \/><\/p>\n<p>More on Android Auto:<\/p>\n<p>Follow Ben:\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/NexusBen\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Twitter\/X<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.threads.net\/@nexusben\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Threads<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/bsky.app\/profile\/nexusben.com\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Bluesky<\/a>, and\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/nexusben\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Instagram<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\t\t<a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/google.com\/preferences\/source?q=https:\/\/9to5google.com\" aria-label=\"Add 9to5Google as a preferred source on Google\"><br \/>\n\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" class=\"google-preferred-source-badge-dark\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/google-preferred-source-badge-dark.png\" alt=\"Add 9to5Google as a preferred source on Google\"\/><br \/>\n\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" class=\"google-preferred-source-badge-light\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/google-preferred-source-badge-light.png\" alt=\"Add 9to5Google as a preferred source on Google\"\/><br \/>\n\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"disclaimer-affiliate\">FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. <a href=\"https:\/\/9to5mac.com\/about\/#affiliate\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">More.<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/bit.ly\/43RjEnY\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-701536\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/1768958530_115_iMazing_-WWDC25_9to5mac_750x150@2x-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"700\" height=\"140\"\/><\/a>\t\t\t\t<script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><script async src=\"\/\/www.instagram.com\/embed.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Google is rolling out a redesign to the media player on Android Auto alongside the latest widely available&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":243501,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[342,111,139,69,145],"class_list":{"0":"post-243500","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mobile","8":"tag-mobile","9":"tag-new-zealand","10":"tag-newzealand","11":"tag-nz","12":"tag-technology"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243500","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=243500"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243500\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/243501"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=243500"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=243500"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=243500"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}