My android app is working on DHU but not seen on Android auto car screen

Question

I just started to develop apps for cars a month ago and still a lot of black spots in my mind. I have developed an android app for navigation that can be used in Android car mirroring. When I test my app on DHU everything works perfect but I tried to test my app on a real car screen connected to android phone over bluetooth and even USB and my app is not shown on the car screen launcher.

In my mobile side of the app I use a CarConnection to see when phone is connected to car so that I can use car screen and that connection observer triggers when I open the app on phone while connected to car. But when I check the car screen launcher still not see my app there.

I have checked my Android auto Customize Launcher on my phone and the app was not there not even on the hidden Apps Section, like it shows on my DHU.

I have tried enable/disable developer options.

I have CarService declared on Manifest like so:

<service android:name="com.package.name.MyAutoService"
            android:exported="true">
            <intent-filter>
                <action android:name="androidx.car.app.CarAppService"/>
                <category android:name="androidx.car.app.category.NAVIGATION"/>
            </intent-filter>
            <intent-filter>
                <action android:name="androidx.car.app.action.NAVIGATE" />
                <category android:name="android.intent.category.DEFAULT"/>
                <data android:scheme="geo" />
            </intent-filter>
        </service>

I mention that on mobile I have installed a debug apk.

Does anyone know what am I doing wrong or what should I do? I really need to make sure how this app would look on a real screen.

Answer 1

Have you turned on the "Unknown sources" setting in the Android Auto app's developer settings?

If not, apps must be installed from a trusted source to be runnable on a real car's head unit. The easiest way to distribute your app from a trusted source would be to use Play's Internal App Sharing or an Internal Test Track. See Test in real vehicles for more details.