See the Android Auto settings screen on a car dashboard
Nobody wants to learn a menu while parked outside a supermarket with the engine running. The in-car interface is deliberately small, which makes it easy to explore ahead of time and hard to explore well from the driver's seat. Here the whole thing sits on a dashboard frame in a browser tab, at your own pace.
At a glance
Loading Android Auto gives you a car dashboard with the Settings app in front of you. The ordering, the grouping and the nesting are the system's own, not a simplified summary of it. The counts below come from the tree itself, so they move only when the tree does.
- 16top-level entries
- 76rows in total
- 3levels deep
- 2versions
| Device family | In-car |
|---|---|
| Frame shown | Car dashboard |
| Versions | 11, 10 |
| Deepest path | 3 levels below the main list |
| Interface languages | 12, switchable while you browse |
| Account needed | No — it runs entirely in your browser |
How Android Auto organises Settings
Sixteen entries and about 76 rows in total: this is the shortest list of any system covered here, and that restraint is the design philosophy stated plainly. A screen you glance at while moving cannot afford depth, so the tree stops at three levels. Customize launcher, Wallpaper and Show weather handle what you see. Video, Notifications, Auto-play media and Day/Night mode handle behaviour. Connection preferences, Google Assistant and About Android Auto handle the link to the phone. Rearview & parking, Media, Messaging and Sound & voice group the driving tasks, and Driving safety sits among them rather than being tucked away.
Compare it with the phone system it depends on and the contrast is the point. A handset settings tree runs to hundreds of rows and five or six levels; this one is flat enough that almost every option is two taps from the top. Customize launcher is the closest thing to real depth, letting you reorder Maps, Media, Phone, Google Assistant and Settings on the home row. Where people get stuck is the boundary: plenty of behaviour that feels like a car setting is actually a phone setting, and no amount of scrolling in the dashboard menu will surface it.
Three settings worth finding
Settings > Day/Night mode > Automatic (based on car)The dashboard can take its light and dark cue from the vehicle's own headlight state rather than from a clock or a sensor. Finding this explains why a screen sometimes darkens in a tunnel and sometimes does not, which puzzles a lot of new users.
Settings > Notifications > Show message previewsThis governs whether incoming message text appears on the car screen or stays hidden until you ask for it aloud. It is the single most useful switch for anyone who regularly has a passenger and would rather not broadcast their messages.
Settings > Customize launcher > MapsThe launcher row can be reordered, and Maps is usually the item people want first. Worth knowing because rearranging the row is quicker than learning to hit a small target in the wrong position while the car is moving.
Versions of Android Auto you can open
There are 2 builds of Android Auto to choose from, which is enough to watch the menu drift over time rather than guess at it.
How this menu got here
Projected car interfaces began as a mirror of the phone, then gained their own settings screen as drivers needed to control notification behaviour and screen brightness without unlocking the handset. Over successive releases the list grew a launcher customisation entry, split media and messaging preferences apart, and added an explicit safety section. The two versions offered here, 11 and 10, sit close together, so differences between them are mostly wording and ordering rather than wholesale change, which makes them a good pair for spotting small shifts.
Who this is useful for
Drivers who have just bought a car with a compatible head unit get the clearest benefit, since they can learn the layout in a chair rather than in traffic. Dealership staff demonstrating a vehicle can rehearse the tap path, fleet managers writing a one-page instruction sheet can copy the exact wording, and anyone deciding between projection and a built-in system can see how little there is to configure.
What is real and what is sample data
The structure is the real thing: menu names, their order, how they are grouped and what sits inside each one. That is why this article can quote a path such as Settings > Day/Night mode > Automatic (based on car) and expect it to match your car dashboard.
The state cannot be. A device name, an address, a build number, a network name, a storage figure, whether a particular switch is on or off — those belong to a physical car dashboard, not to a menu tree. Everywhere the simulator shows a value like that it is clearly-marked sample data: a placeholder that tells you where the number appears, not what any real device would say.
Try it yourself
Start at the top of Android Auto and open every row once. It takes a few minutes and it is the fastest way to stop guessing which section a given option lives under. Comparison mode will hold Android Auto next to another system if you want to see the two layouts against each other. The search will also work backwards: give it a setting name and it reports where every system files it.
Open Android Auto in the simulatorFree, no account, works offline — 76 settings rows across 2 versions.Key points
- Android Auto shows 16 top-level entries and 76 rows in total, nested up to 3 levels.
- Menu names and their order come from the settings tree itself, so the paths quoted here match the real car dashboard.
- Anything that belongs to a specific device — names, addresses, build numbers, switch positions — is a marked sample.
Questions about Android Auto settings
Is this a real car dashboard?
No. It is a browser simulator drawn on a dashboard-shaped frame, running entirely on your own device with no account and no installation. It reproduces the layout and wording of the settings screen so you can practise the taps, but it does not connect to a vehicle and it is not affiliated with Google.
Why are there so few settings compared with a phone?
By design. A screen used while driving has to be readable at a glance, so the tree is kept shallow, stopping at three levels and around 76 rows in total. Much of the behaviour you might expect to configure here is set on the phone instead, which is a common source of confusion for new users.
Can I check what changed between versions 10 and 11?
Yes, both are available and you can switch between them without leaving your position in the menu. Because the two releases are close together, most of what you will notice is renaming and reordering rather than new sections, so viewing them one after the other is the practical way to catch it.