I have a 2024 Lexus RX350 with an iPhone paired to it. I have the Google app installed on my phone to access my Google Nest cameras. In the past, sometimes (but not always) when I opened the app to view the cameras the car radio would mute and the screen would indicate that a call was in progress (but there was no active call). If I closed the app the radio would come back on. Today every time I started the car the radio would mute and say call in progress even though I was not using the Google app. I tried to hang up the phone but that would not work. I finally tried force closing the app and everything came back to normal. Has anyone else had a similar problem or know of what the problem might be?

 

Sounds like your Google app froze in the background.

 

Home cameras frequently have microphones for two-way communications. When I view my garage cam on my phone, my podcast stops.

I think what is happening is when you open a Nest cam with the Google app, the phone/car sees the mic open on the cam a mutes everything else.

Now why this happens when the Google app is open, but you are not viewing the cam I suspect is an issue with the google app reporting the wrong thing to the car.

You can try just using your phone outside the car and listening to a podcast for example, and then while listening, load Google app/camera and experiment. I suspect you will see the same issue. I think the car is just responding to what the app is telling it, albeit incorrect at times.

Are you using Android auto by chance? If not, you might try that so see if the interface behaves better.

 

If you have a Samsung, you can separate the audio on Bluetooth and phone speaker to where you can play different audios on each output (example you can play spotify on Bluetooth car speakers as output while watching YouTube videos on speaker phone as audio output).

You can put your goggle nest app audio output on phone speaker in the separate audio settings.

Not sure if this setting applies in android auto. I'll need to try this.