I’m working on a project where I need to turn a regular Android tablet into a dedicated device that only runs one specific app. The goal is to completely hide the standard Android interface and make it so users can only interact with my custom application.
Basically, I want to create a kiosk-style setup where the device boots directly into my app and users can’t access anything else like the home screen, settings, or other apps.
I know that iOS has some enterprise features that let you lock down devices in similar ways. Does Android offer comparable options through its development tools?
What would be the best approach to achieve this? I’d prefer to keep using the Android framework since it works great for touch interfaces and most developers are familiar with it. I just need to figure out how to make my app take complete control of the device experience.
Any technical guidance or specific APIs I should look into would be really helpful.
Interesting setup! What happens if your app crashes though? Does the device just sit there broken until someone manually fixes it? Also curious - are you distributing these tablets to end users or keeping them internal? The deployment method will affect which lockdown approach works best.
I’ve done something similar for retail setups. The Device Owner approach works great, but setting it up is a pain. You’ll need a custom launcher to replace the home screen, then use setLockTaskPackages() to pin your app and stop people from switching tasks. For crashes, build a watchdog service that monitors your main app and auto-restarts it. You can kill the status bar pulldown and nav buttons through Device Policy Manager. Just heads up - test the hell out of it on your actual hardware. Some manufacturers have custom UI stuff that might still show up. Also, Device Owner mode requires a factory reset, so plan your deployment accordingly.
check out android’s device owner mode - set ur app as a kiosk using devicepolicymanager. there’s also immersive mode, but device owner gives u way more control over the system ui and actually prevents users from escaping ur app. just heads up - u’ll probably need to factory reset to enable it.