Error inflating class android.webkit.WebView happens sporadically in production

Question

my application is on Google Play and it runs fine on most of devices (thousands of users). But in rare cases (fraction of percent of daily active users) I get Error in

Answer 1

To fix this problem that appears on Android Lollipop you can use a custom WebView that creates a new configuration only on Android Lollipop (API 21 and 22). Replace the WebView on your XML layout with this custom WebView.

import android.annotation.TargetApi;
import android.content.Context;
import android.content.res.Configuration;
import android.os.Build;
import android.util.AttributeSet;
import android.webkit.WebView;

public class LollipopFixedWebView extends WebView {

    public LollipopFixedWebView(Context context) {
        super(getFixedContext(context));
    }

    public LollipopFixedWebView(Context context, AttributeSet attrs) {
        super(getFixedContext(context), attrs);
    }

    public LollipopFixedWebView(Context context, AttributeSet attrs, int defStyleAttr) {
        super(getFixedContext(context), attrs, defStyleAttr);
    }

    // To fix Android Lollipop WebView problem create a new configuration on that Android version only
    private static Context getFixedContext(Context context) {
        if (Build.VERSION.SDK_INT == 21 || Build.VERSION.SDK_INT == 22) // Android Lollipop 5.0 & 5.1
            return context.createConfigurationContext(new Configuration());
        return context;
    }
}