Ford's Integrated Android Auto With A Giant Panoramic Display Comes Into View

Ford just made a tour de force show of its latest Sync in-car infotainment in a Lincoln Nautilus. Besides sporting an edge-to-edge panoramic display controlled by a central 11-inch touchscreen, the system is the first time Sync will be based on Google's Android OS with graphics powered by Epic's Unreal engine. 

In case you thought line-of-sight speedometer or multifunction displays like that on a Prius or Forester are boring, Ford might have something to wow your senses. In an initiative called the Ford and Lincoln Digital Experience, Ford has revealed its vision for how vehicle infotainment should be done. Gone is the Blackberry QNX-based Sync OS, as the new Sync runs a skinned version of Android OS, which allows users more native in-car experiences of popular Google apps, such as Google Maps and Spotify.

The ultimate version of this new OS was demoed in a 2024 Lincoln Nautilus that's available with a 48-inch 4K display that spans the width of the windshield in the eye-line of the driver in lieu of the traditional speedometer pod. This means that the widescreen, first and foremost, displays critical vehicle information (e.g. speed, cruise, etc.) in front of the driver, but also shows supportive information such as weather, fuel economy, and media through widgets on the right side of the display.


Controlling all that information is primarily done through a smaller central display in the center console (in this case, an 11.1-inch unit). Unfortunately, even adjusting air-conditioning settings or adjusting the volume will require poking the screen rather than physical controls. 

Chasing Tesla's and Honda's similar offering of a full-bodied infotainment system that can handle AAA gaming, Ford's new system touts more than five times the processing power, 14 times more graphical capabilities, and eight times more storage compared to current systems in Ford's lineup. 

While this 48-inch display configuration is currently only available in the Chinese-manufactured Nautilus, Ford says other configurations will trickle down throughout its product line, although specifics haven't been revealed.