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I'm looking to tunnel my connection on Firefox, for example, through a VPN while keeping Chrome, or any other apps not listed, connected to my home wifi without a VPN connection.

I'm aware that this was previously deemed impossible due to the frameworks provided by macOS, but earlier this year, PIA released an update allowing split-tunneling. I've tested it, and it does work for Firefox and some other apps, but not everything. I also don't particularly want to be locked in to a certain provider for this.

Do any protocols like Wireguard support split tunneling on macOS these days thanks to recent changes in the system? Or, do any other providers offer this feature?

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  • After some more digging, it looks like both ExpressVPN and Mullvad also support this in macOS.
    – jslp
    Commented Aug 29 at 23:52
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    Mulled looks more limited than PIA - it only allows exclusions from VPN tunnel. ExpressVPN says not support for macOS 11+. AFAIK PIA is the only established product with application level split tunnel - and it works for me and is the main reason I renew my subscription.
    – Gilby
    Commented Aug 30 at 2:46
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    "Do any protocols like Wireguard support split tunneling" - this does not depend on the VPN protocol (i.e. how data are encapsulated for transport) but on the routing (which network interface / tunnel are used by the application for a specific destination).
    – Steffen Ullrich
    Commented Aug 30 at 3:39

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macOS and iOS and iPadOS do not prevent split tunneling ever. That just is a routing choice that you can make when you choose your network setup. Apple has also designed robust per application VPN API and SDK, but your chosen apps have to implement that design for it to work. I don’t think Firefox cares to implement code using Apple’s design, complicating your needs rather than simplifying them.

Your problem is the people running the VPN are restricting your choices or not exposing the complexity since they believe people will mess up and complain. It’s their business to run and supporting people is very expensive if you do it well. Simplifying offerings is a valid business objective IMO.

Per-application VPN are tricky to grok for many and worse, browsers often don’t or respect the system DNS and proxy settings. Tracing actual network packets is also very opaque, technical and hard to verify your setup is correct and not leaking traffic to other interfaces. Much simpler is to run those apps in a VM is you really need total control over routing.

Without specific details on your research, your needs or your budget and skills, I hesitate to offer more than general advice above which is from my experience. (Also, shopping questions are off topic, so I’m choosing to steer this to a technical discussion and not helping you find a provider or replace their pre-sales support team’s job to assist you in your buying decision.)

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