Apple has registered Apple.car and other similar domain names

whois car

Apple has registered a handful of rather interesting domain names within the last few weeks. As noted by MacRumors, the company purchased three top-level domain names in December including apple.car, apple.cars and apple.auto, through sponsored registrar MarkMonitor.

The acquisitions only posted on Whois this morning, and they aren’t active yet, but given the ongoing chatter regarding Apple’s secret car project, they do arouse curiosity. There’s certainly a precedent of the firm purchasing domain names for rumored projects: iCloud and iPhone 4.

There are a few theories here. The boring version is that Apple plans to use the domains to market its CarPlay product. Launched in 2014, CarPlay allows auto-makers to embed deep iPhone integration in their infotainment systems. The project has really been picking up steam lately.

More exciting, though, is that the domains are possibly being set aside for Project Titan. Apple has put together a team of high profile engineers and executives from the auto industry, and rumor has it that they are working on an autonomous, electric car, with plans to launch by 2020.

Source: Whois via MacRumors