Earlier this year, following the launch of the iPhone 15, some users started reporting problems when trying to wireless charge in their cars. In the case of BMW drivers, the chargers would break their phone’s NFC chip. Meanwhile GM drivers found that iOS 17.1 broke in-car wireless charging altogether.
The BMW issue was apparently fixed in iOS 17.1.1, which is good news for those drivers. The GM problem was a little less serious, since the only symptom was loss of wireless charging in the car. Definitely annoying, but it’s not like you’d need to replace your phone because of your choice of car.
GM confirmed the problem in a statement to The Verge last month. The automaker claimed that it was investigating the problem, but there wasn’t anything it could actually do at the time. Apple’s iOS 17.2 release notes don’t mention GM by name, but it does mention that the update will fix “an issue that may prevent wireless charging in certain vehicles”.
It’s safe to assume that GM cars are the main focus of this particular bug fix, even if Apple hasn’t outwardly said so. Then again there could be other cars suffering from the same problem, and we just don’t know about it. Either way, all affected drivers will have to do is wait for the public version of iOS 17.2 to be released and update their phones accordingly.
Currently the software is only available in beta form, in the iOS 17.2 developer and public betas. You can install the public beta for yourself, if you’re that impatient, but we are expecting iOS 17.2 to launch pretty soon. It could even happen at some point later this week, given all the pre-release prep we’ve seen — release notes being just one part of that.
There are other things coming to iOS 17.2 as well. The new Journal app will launch alongside the software, after being announced back at WWDC 2023, while iMessage will get extra security in the form of contact key verification. Users will also be able to disable inline autocorrect predictions, and the iPhone 15 Pro will gain the ability to record spatial video for the Apple Vision Pro headset.
Most interestingly, it’s been confirmed that iOS 17.2 will unlock Qi2 wireless charging support on iPhone 13 and iPhone 14 devices. There aren’t many Qi2 chargers right now, but it does mean you can unlock full-speed wireless charging without necessarily buying an approved MagSafe charger.
