I've had CarPlay on my last two cars, a 2018 VW Golf and a 2024 Ford Maverick. It's fine. Sometimes you plug your phone into the USB port (unlocked) and it refuses to connect for several minutes very frustrating when you want to start navigation and media playback before leaving the driveway. My favourite headunit experience was my aftermarket single DIN Kenwood (https://www.kenwood.com/ca/car/caraudio/receivers/kdc-bt282u...) in my MK4 Golf it was an easy swap. You could plug in any iPod or iPhone and it would play and control the audio directly from the headunit and show title information on the display. Plus, it would take any USB storage device and play music. It was such a simple and efficient experience.