We may never get to see the long-in-development Apple Car, but we may have a closer idea of what it would've looked like.
In his Power On newsletter, Mark Gurman of Bloomberg said the Apple Car could've looked something like the Canoo Lifestyle minivan shown above.
It's certainly an interesting look, but as Gurman reported last week, Apple's indecisiveness and hubris caused the project to stall so we don't have a true look at how it could have looked.
"The Apple car’s circa-2020 design resembled the Canoo Lifestyle Vehicle — a futuristic van with rounded edges — but it had dark black windows with an adjustable tint," Gurman explains, pointing to an all-glass sunroof, white exterior, and whitewall tires with a black center.
The car was optimized for Level 5 self-driving (the highest level of automation), despite offering a minimal interface. One source told Gurman that the car made you feel like you were in a "contoured bubble", and the car would accommodate four passengers comfortably.
The Apple "Bread Loaf"
It's been a while since Jony Ive was part of the Apple design process, but Gurman notes a prior vision of the car looked akin to a 1950s Volkswagen Microbus and was dubbed the 'Bread Loaf', while another version "looked nearly identical to the 2017 Volkswagen ID Buzz prototype."
That second one is interesting because some Apple employees moved to Volkswagen in the mid-2010s, but subsequent efforts took shape to the point where Tim Cook and COO Jeff Williams gave a speech at the company's test track in Arizona to commit to development in 2020.
By the time Apple canceled the project, its last major design had dropped from Level 5 automation down to Level 2, re-adding the steering wheel and pedals.
