Does getting pre-approved for a car loan hurt my credit?

It depends on the lender. Some use a soft inquiry, which doesn't affect your score, while others use a hard inquiry, which can lower it slightly for a short time. Credit scoring models generally treat multiple auto-loan inquiries within a short shopping window as a single inquiry. On OffLot, getting pre-approved does not affect your credit score, and in the current preview the Social Security number and date of birth fields are locked and answers are never saved or sent.