I hear you loud and clear.
I am also considering a new car, the first for many years. The tech on this car is great and fully up to date, but guess what? People are complaining that the Apple CarPlay is horribly glitchy: low volume, crashes regularly, works/doesn't work randomly; call quality awful etc. Everyone 'in the know' seems to have established that the problem is on Apple's side, not the car manufacturer's.
Meanwhile, all the owners of this car with Android 'phones are getting full usage out of Android Auto, with hardly any complaints at all.
How embarrassing for Apple - one of the wealthiest companies in the world.
With this and the simultaneous problems that have caused me so much angst and time wastage concerning Apple Music (of which I am a paying, family-sharing member) since the iOS 18 update, it does make me wonder whether it's time to change.
It's all very well being a loyal Apple user (since 2012; numerous family iPhones, Macs, MacBooks, TV, etc), but if this is how the company repays its customers, it's time to rethink where we spend our money!
Do us all a favour and if you have any of these issues, please go to the Apple Feedback page (you can find it easily via any search engine) and log a bug report/complaint. Apple does not typically read the user Community forums I am writing this on now. Whereas Feedback page submissions are the only bits of customer feedback that the company actually promises to read. If they get enough submissions concerning one particular issue, they are more likely to do something about it.
Thanks and good luck.