I recently decided to start using a VPN; once I did, Android Auto immediately stopped working. Most Google searches indicated that "split tunneling" had to be enabled, so that's what I did. However, much to my dismay, that did not solve the problem. It turns out that I had only had part of the solution. The missing piece of information was to turn off the kill switch in the VPN. Once I did that, AA started behaving normally again. In case others are experiencing the same issue, I have created a brief tutorial on how to do both items.

*please note, I am using ProtonVPN; if you are using a different VPN, the steps may be slightly different, but the general idea is the same.

To enable split tunneling:

  1. Tap the icon of your VPN to open it
  2. Tap on, "settings"
  3. Scroll down to, "split tunneling", which is located in the "features" section and tap on it
  4. Tap on the switch to enable split tunneling
  5. Tap on, "excluded apps"
  6. Scroll down to the bottom, and tap on, "show system apps"
  7. Tap on the +sign next to Android Auto, then tap on, "save"
  8. You will see a prompt saying, "new settings will apply next time you connect"; tap on, "reconnect now"
  9. You have successfully whitelisted Android Auto to work with your VPN

To turn off the kill switch:

  1. Tap the VPN icon to open it
  2. Tap on, "settings"
  3. Under the, "features" section, tap on, "kill switch"
  4. Tap on, "open Android settings"
  5. Click on the, "settings" icon
  6. Turn OFF the, "block connections without VPN" switch

Once you have done both, you should be able to use Android Auto with your VPN running. I hope this is able to help someone who is having this particular issue.

This relates to all apps that you want to go outside of the VPN tunnel. You cannot use the VPN apps' split tunneling features when "block connections without VPN" is enabled. The VPN app might not inform you of this, nor try to detect whether or not its split tunneling feature is working correctly on your device.