Apple confirms CarPlay is coming to Pioneer aftermarket media systems

You won’t have to buy a brand-new vehicle in order to get CarPlay, Apple’s upcoming iPhone-powered dashboard for the car. Pioneer announced today that it will be among the first to sell aftermarket media receivers that support CarPlay. That will start with five of its existing units, which will gain support through a firmware update this summer. Those units, all in its 2014 NEX series of receivers, range from $700 to $1,400. It was previously reported that other aftermarket systems could go on sale with CarPlay as well.

Apple confirmed to The Verge that Pioneer will be selling aftermarket receivers. It’s an altogether different approach than what Apple has taken in some time — long choosing to retain tight control over both hardware and software — but with the difficulty of taking over a major vehicle component and the coming competition from big names like Google and Microsoft, it may be interested in getting its system out there as soon as it can. That said, CarPlay is only active so long as an iPhone is attached, so it may only be a matter of making sure that the system is available to drivers who want it.