This handy in-car dongle works with both iPhone and Android making it a must-buy

Do you drive a car that’s new enough to have Android Auto and Apple CarPlay baked into the infotainment system, but also old enough that you still need to plug in your phones to use ’em? The $65/£50 AAWireless Two+ will bring cord-free convenience, without the expense of a third-party stereo upgrade, and handles more phones than you have car seats.

I’ve had the unassuming little black box plugged into my car’s USB port for the last month, and now can’t imagine driving without it – largely because of how well it handles multiple devices.

My wife and I share the one car, but she’s an iPhone user and I’m exclusively Android: the cheap, no-name dongles I’d tried in the past weren’t smart enough to work out which one of us was driving, so would often pick up my handset – despite it being inside the house at the time rather than in the car. This petite puck has a companion app that lets you set device priority, so I can always have it look for my wife’s iPhone first.

Giving the single multifunction button on the box itself a prod when I get in to drive switches it to my Android device, then a double-press hands back priority to my wife’s handset, with no need for either of us to re-pair our phones. As far as she’s concerned, CarPlay is now get-in-and-go.

The switch takes around 30 seconds – not the quickest, but hardly an age either. Once up and running the connection is lag-free and uninterrupted, which is more than I can say for the two cheaper dongles I’d tried previously. Pairing is almost as seamless as if you were connecting directly to the car, and AAWireless claims compatibility with a huge number of car makes and models.

I can only speak for a 2020 Vauxhall Corsa, which had zero issues – though this car doesn’t have Android Auto/CarPlay passthrough to its digital instrument cluster. I can’t say if that functions as intended on cars with that tech.

The overall design hasn’t hasn’t changed from the AAWireless Two: this is still a matchbox-sized hunk of black plastic with a single button on the front and a USB-C port at the end. The button has a multi-colour status LED that can thankfully be dimmed through the companion app. A short, braided USB Type-A to Type-C cable is included in the box – installation is as easy as plugging it into the port your car designates for Android Auto and Apple CarPlay.

In my car that’s found in a large centre console cubby, meaning the box sits loose. I would have preferred a dongle with a built-in USB connector, but understand that other car brands put their ports in tighter locations – or under arm rests – that would make it impossible to use. The short cable is a sensible compromise, and some double-sided tap now holds it largely out of view.

The unit never got uncomfortably hot, even after hours of driving.

On one longer journey I did wonder if a passthrough USB port for extra device charging might’ve been an idea – then quickly remembered that I could just plug my phone in if it was in need of a top up, rather than use the wireless connection.

It may not be the cheapest adapter of its kind, or the easiest to stow out of sight on account of the box-and-cable design, but the the AAWireless Two+ is still quite affordable and I can’t fault its connectivity. For multi-OS households, it’s the best in-car entertainment upgrade out there.