How to find out from code if my Android app runs on emulator or real device?

Question

I have read this stackoverflow thread already and I tried using the code given in that answer to find out if I run my code on the emulator or on a real device:

Answer 1

I think that the best answer is to decide why you actually care to know - and then check for whatever specific characteristic of the emulator you believe requires that your app behave differently than it would on a device.

Answer 2

How about this solution:

  public static boolean isRunningOnEmulator()
    {
    boolean result=//
        Build.FINGERPRINT.startsWith("generic")//
            ||Build.FINGERPRINT.startsWith("unknown")//
            ||Build.MODEL.contains("google_sdk")//
            ||Build.MODEL.contains("Emulator")//
            ||Build.MODEL.contains("Android SDK built for x86");
    if(result)
      return true;
    result|=Build.BRAND.startsWith("generic")&&Build.DEVICE.startsWith("generic");
    if(result)
      return true;
    result|="google_sdk".equals(Build.PRODUCT);
    return result;
    }

Answer 3

As stated in this post, IMEI and IMSI are harcoded on the emulator:

2325     { "+CIMI", OPERATOR_HOME_MCCMNC "000000000", NULL },   /* request internation subscriber identification number */
2326     { "+CGSN", "000000000000000", NULL },   /* request model version */

You can easily get the value using

adb shell dumpsys iphonesubinfo

So checking the device's IMEI using TelephonyManager.getDeviceId() should be sufficient to find out, whether you're on an emulator or a real device.


To be absolutely sure, you might combine it with checking the model name as stated by various other posts.

public static boolean isRunningOnEmulator(final Context inContext) {

    final TelephonyManager theTelephonyManager = (TelephonyManager)inContext.getSystemService(Context.TELEPHONY_SERVICE);
    final boolean hasEmulatorImei = theTelephonyManager.getDeviceId().equals("000000000000000");
    final boolean hasEmulatorModelName = Build.MODEL.contains("google_sdk")
            || Build.MODEL.contains("Emulator")
            || Build.MODEL.contains("Android SDK");

    return hasEmulatorImei || hasEmulatorModelName;
}

The downside to this approach is that you need a context to access this information and instantiating a TelephonyManager for every check.