Is the AUX cord finished?

The 3.5 input/ output cord, better known as the AUX cord, has been apart of most of our lives. We see it a lot when when listening to music and many Djs rely on this for their craft. But, car radios followed suit and began adding this feature to most aftermarket radios. Later on, the car industry picked up on this and decided to add them into their base car radios. Thus the AUX cord was thrown into the spotlight with many people driving their car listening to music using it. They could also pass the cord to a friend and let them share their music, there was only one rule; never pass the AUX if their music isn’t fire. But, now we have bluetooth technology and USB ports in cars, so has the AUX cord finally seen its end in the auto industry?

When everything your friend plays is fire.

Let’s talk about the main source of our music, our smartphones. We play downloaded music or even stream music from Spotify or Pandora but phones have changed over time. Recently, Apple decided to do away with the 3.5 audio jack in their newest iphones, the iphone 7,8,10 and X. With Apple dominating the smartphone market and just last year being beat out by Samsung it’s hard to not see what they believe the future is. Granted they have not fully discontinued the 3.5 audio jack but, it is a separate piece for the phone that many would rather not carry around. Clearly the advent of wireless earbuds is case for the elimination of the 3.5 audio jack as well.. Now, Samsung on the other hand leads the world now in the smartphone market but that is mostly due to their smartphone features, not the 3.5 audio jack on their devices, but most other android devices still have the 3.5 jack as well so that is also something to think about.

Bluetooth tech at its finest.

Let’s talk about bluetooth technology now in cars. Bluetooth tech has been around for awhile, ever since 1994. This allowed us to enter the wireless era of technology, wireless headsets, wireless speakers and wireless radios. Many products have come from this technology such as OnStar and man-overboard alarms; alarms that are dedicated to alerting crew members to someone falling off the ship and can be tracked via GPS. But, the one we take for granted is our ability to wirelessly stream music inside our vehicle. Less cords inside the car lead to less distractions for the driver making the roads safer.

No longer are we held down by two cords at once.

But the positive side of the Aux Cord is that we are no longer are we fighting for connectivity nor do we need wifi to play music. We have a hard connection to music in our cars and trucks. We just plug it in, hit play and go. No latency or frustration. Though there are many cars who have wi-fi technology it is still more of a feature in cars and users must pay for the actual service, $20 or more a month. Also, when on a road trip with friends it is easy to switch to someone else’s music. Just pass them the AUX and plug it in and hit play. No trying to connect via bluetooth and make everything a bit of a challenge when switching over to someone else’s phone. Also we still find the cord being used everywhere today. Home entertainment systems, speakers, radios, audio boards, etc… they are still around.

AUX forever.

Honestly I do not think the AUX cord is dead. I don’t think it will ever die but it might be phased out just like all technology. You will still be able to find them in stores 50 years from now or even a milenia from now. There will always be a need to hard connect devices because let us be honest technology fails and sometimes going old school is the only way to do things.