More in-depth CarPlay Ultra coverage by Ars Technica.
Finally, someone tested what would happen to the CarPlay Ultra UI when your iPhone restarts or is shut down. It’s what I expected, but a reboot still has annoying connectivity issues:
I tested Ultra with an iPhone 16 Pro, but the software requires an iPhone 12 or newer and the latest iOS 18.5 update. As a type of simple failure exercise, I turned my phone off while driving more than once. Doing so reverts both the gauge cluster and infotainment screen to Aston's native UI, the former almost instantly and the latter just a few seconds later. However, once I turned my phone back on, I struggled to reactivate either traditional CarPlay or Ultra until I forgot the device in my Bluetooth settings and started over from scratch. This held true for every attempt.
There’s more issues such as lag in the gauges…of a super car:
Call me old-fashioned, but I still enjoy seeing a tachometer, speedometer, drive modes, and fuel level versus range remaining and a digital speed—especially on an engaging performance vehicle like the DB12 Volante. Apple might be skilled at making new tech easy to use, but it's hard to beat the power of millions of minds adapting to analog gauges over the past century or so. And in this case, Ultra's tach(s) showed a bit of latency or lag while ripping that 671-hp twin-turbo V8 up through the revs, something I never noticed in the native UI.
This article claims that CarPlay Ultra is more holistic with access to more controls, but there are several instances where Michael either prefers the native Aston Martin UI or CarPlay Ultra. The gauges are laggy and the default Aston Martin ones are better, but the climate controls in CarPlay Ultra are better than the defaults. Opening the convertible top had issues, and specific audio controls required going into Aston’s control menu. It sounds like the mess that is iPad multi-tasking.
Other things to consider:
Photos 2-6 in the first set of 12 photos showing the setup process are labelled incorrectly, and are Aston Martin’s setup terms and not Apple’s even though they’re attributed to CarPlay Ultra. I don’t think Apple is going to share your information with insurance companies.
Read the comment by UnnDunn to get more information about how CarPlay Ultra interacts with the vehicle’s in terms of safety systems.
They completely murdered Apple’s Style Guide rules by referring to CarPlay Ultra as “Ultra” the whole time, which is just confusing and sounds unprofessional.