For several decades, the primary goal of the automotive industry has been to reduce harmful emissions and improve fuel economy. Gasoline engines are clean and powerful propulsion systems, but have poorer fuel economy than that of diesel engines. However, due to the development of new technologies such as variable valve timing and lift and direct gasoline injection, controlled autoignition (CAI) combustion can be realized. CAI engines combine the advantages of cleaner emissions and lower fuel consumption than conventional spark-ignition gasoline engines. In this study, a cylinder-pressure-based combustion phase detection method for CAI combustion is proposed. This method utilizes a normalized difference pressure (NDP), which is defined as the normalized pressure difference between the firing and motoring in-cylinder pressures. The proposed method was developed and validated with steady-state experimental data from an inline 4 cylinder, 2 L gasoline direct injection (GDI) CAI engine. Because the calculations in the NDP method are faster and simpler than in the conventional combustion phase detection method in CAI engines, this method can be embedded in a real-time controller. Furthermore, the proposed method displayed good accuracy in detecting the combustion phase and thus stabilized CAI combustion. Finally, the detailed experimental results are presented.