Audi is expanding its Themes system with Personal Themes, allowing drivers to turn their own photos into custom digital backgrounds for compatible vehicles.

Audi is giving drivers more control over the look of their car’s cabin with an expanded Audi Themes experience. The system lets owners customize compatible infotainment displays and, on equipped vehicles, coordinate the interior lighting with the selected design. The biggest addition is Personal Themes, which allows eligible customers to turn their own photos into digital themes.

Turn Your Photos Into a Car Theme

Personal Themes are created directly through the myAudi app. Owners can use photos of family members, pets, vacations, or even favorite Audi models and turn them into customized backgrounds.

Users can keep up to three Personal Themes at a time. The themes are connected to the customer’s myAudi account and can be used across compatible vehicles.

Audi’s new Personal Themes feature lets drivers create custom infotainment designs using their own photos.

The feature requires an active myAudi account and Audi Themes access. If a user logs out of the account or no longer has access, the Personal Themes are removed from the vehicle.

Audi Has More Than 340 Designs

The customization options go beyond personal photos.

Audi first introduced Themes in the U.S. in December 2023. Since then, its library has grown from fewer than 50 designs to more than 340 curated experiences.

The catalog includes landscapes, travel imagery, abstract artwork, seasonal designs, and special-event themes.

Audi’s Themes catalog includes more than 340 professionally designed experiences.

Audi has also changed how customers access the catalog. Instead of only purchasing individual themes, eligible owners can subscribe to the full library through the myAudi Marketplace. Existing customers who already purchased individual themes can continue using them without an annual subscription.

How Much Does Audi Themes Cost?

Audi Themes is strictly a personalization feature. It does not change vehicle performance, safety systems, driving characteristics, or core infotainment functions.

The company is offering a seven-day trial for $1, plus applicable taxes, on compatible 2023 and newer vehicles. After the trial, access costs $39.99 per year, or about $3.33 per month.

Audi Themes combines digital backgrounds with coordinated interior lighting on compatible vehicles.

For Audi Themes, the latest update pushes in-car personalization closer to the experience consumers already expect from their phones and other digital devices. Drivers can choose a professionally designed look or create something personal, making the vehicle’s digital cabin feel more closely tied to its owner.

Hyundai’s new Pleos Connect infotainment system impressed during a test drive, combining a large touchscreen, physical controls, wireless smartphone integration, and a promising AI assistant.

Hyundai is preparing to roll out a completely new infotainment experience, and an early test drive suggests Pleos Connect could be one of the company’s most intuitive systems yet.

The system was tested in a South Korean-market Hyundai Grandeur and combines a large central display with physical controls and a smartphone-inspired interface.

A Smartphone-Like Interface

Pleos Connect uses Google’s Android Automotive OS architecture, while Hyundai developed the user experience internally.

The main display can show up to three tiles.

Hyundai Pleos Connect uses a large dashboard display with a customizable, smartphone-like interface.

The left section containing essential driving information remains fixed, while the other two tiles can be rearranged using a three-finger gesture.

Speed, gear selection, fuel or battery level, and warning information are displayed prominently, while a contextual utility widget provides additional controls.

Climate controls remain accessible along the bottom of the screen, while swiping upward opens the complete climate-control interface.

Physical Controls Are Still Here

Despite the large touchscreen, Hyundai hasn’t completely abandoned traditional controls.

A separate physical control panel provides access to functions including temperature, volume, tuning, hazard lights, fan speed, and drive modes.

Pleos Connect retains physical switches and knobs for frequently used vehicle functions.

Some controls use touch-sensitive surfaces, however, meaning drivers who prefer traditional buttons may still have some reservations.

The interface also includes light and dark modes that automatically adapt to ambient lighting.

Gleo AI Could Be the Star

One of the most interesting features is Gleo, Hyundai’s AI-powered voice assistant.

The system is designed to understand more complex, conversational requests and execute multiple actions in a single command.

For example, a driver could ask Gleo to activate a heated seat while simultaneously adding a destination to navigation.

Hyundai’s Gleo AI assistant can combine multiple vehicle commands into a single conversational request.

Gleo also displays its responses as text, allowing users to review previous interactions.

There is one major limitation for now: during the test drive, Gleo did not yet support English.

Hyundai says English-language support is coming soon.

An Open Ecosystem

Pleos Connect will also support over-the-air updates and Hyundai’s new App Market.

Developers will be able to create software for the system using vehicle APIs and a development sandbox, although Hyundai will review applications for safety and data-security reasons.

Wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto will also remain available.

The first U.S.-market Hyundai models expected to receive Pleos Connect are the 2027 Elantra and Tucson, with both expected to debut in the U.S. before the end of the year.

A version of the system is also expected to eventually reach Genesis and potentially Kia vehicles.

Based on the initial experience, Hyundai Pleos Connect appears ready for production, with its biggest remaining question being how quickly features such as Gleo can expand into additional languages and capabilities.

Hyundai and Kia have patented a system that combines voice commands with hand gestures, allowing drivers to point at a vehicle feature and control it with simple words.

Hyundai and Kia are exploring a new way to interact with vehicles: point at something and simply tell the car what to do.

A newly published U.S. patent application describes technology that combines voice commands with gesture recognition, allowing drivers and passengers to use less specific verbal instructions when the intended target is identified by pointing.

Point at Something and Give a Command

The patent, titled “Method and Apparatus for Performing Voice Command Based on Gesture Recognition,” describes a system that uses cameras and other sensors to monitor hand movements inside the cabin.

The vehicle could combine what a person says with what they are pointing toward.

Hyundai’s patented system combines voice recognition with cameras and sensors that track hand gestures inside the cabin.

For example, instead of saying “open the passenger-side window,” a driver could potentially point toward the window and simply say “open.”

The system would determine the target using the gesture and then execute the corresponding command.

The Car Could Determine Who Is Speaking

The technology is designed to work even when several people are inside the vehicle.

The patent describes determining which seat a voice command originated from and then analyzing the gestures of that specific occupant.

The system could identify which occupant is speaking and associate the command with that person’s hand gesture.

Additional microphones and sensors could be installed for rear passengers, while push-to-talk buttons could also be provided at different seating positions.

That could help the vehicle distinguish between overlapping movements and conversations inside a busy cabin.

Physical Controls Could Also Be Identified

The system would not necessarily be limited to controlling windows and other physical functions.

A passenger could potentially point toward a button, such as Auto Hold, and ask the vehicle what that control does.

The patented system could potentially identify physical controls based on where an occupant points.

The concept is essentially designed to make vehicle interaction more natural by combining spatial awareness, voice recognition, and gesture detection.

However, the patent does not mean Hyundai or Kia will actually introduce the technology in a production vehicle.

The U.S. filing is simply an application seeking patent protection, and a similar application was reportedly submitted in South Korea in 2025.

For Hyundai voice gesture control, the idea is intriguing: instead of memorizing increasingly complicated voice commands, drivers could simply point at something and tell the car what they want.