Our CarPlay car has a small screen, so I prefer to keep navigation full screen most of the time. In split mode, it’s way too tiny for me, but I occasionally leave it there if I know my way around anyways. It’s definitely not a well designed experience.
It sounds like the issue is mostly your CarPlay cars small screen compared to Tesla's large one. This didn't seen to be a CarPlay problem beyond maybr Apple trying their best with the screens most of their customers are given.
