Android is a mobile operating system (OS) based on the Linux kernel and currently developed by Google. Android-x86 is a project to port Android open source project to x86 platform, formerly known as “patch hosting for android x86 support”.

This page is about emulating Android apps and games on PC as it is slowly building off an important library of exclusives, and emulation coupled with CheatEngine is certainly interesting. If you're interested in emulators for your Android phone, check Category:Consoles and see individual console page.

Android is a mobile operating system (OS) based on the Linux kernel and currently developed by Google. Unlike iPhone, as well as older cell-phone models and older Japanese Galapagos mobile phones, emulating Android software on PC is more developed, though no open source emulator with a high degree of game compatibility exists yet.

Like with Nintendo DS emulators, the computer mouse is used to emulate touchscreen presses (which can be less than ideal in many cases), and the keyboard emulates the button controller add-ons. Some emulators support X360 controllers as well with some more tweaks.

Android apps come in the .apk file format (occasionally coupled with .obb files). Just like its iOS equivalent (IPA files), their innards can be opened as a regular ZIP file.

• 1Emulators
• 2General Emulation issues
• 3Emulator Specific Issues

Emulators[edit]

Important Note: These emulators are usually closed source and while they're distributed for free, their devs look for roundabout ways to monetize them. One such high profile case was BlueStacks. Make sure to check if there are pre-installed apps on your emulator (and disable them), monitor your Internet connection download caps and processor activity to detect any abnormal activity (and block domains accordingly if the need arises) and avoid as much as possible giving sensitive account data (just in case it's key-logged). Besides basic safety, these precautions often make impacted emulators run much faster when the adware services and apps are turned off.

PC

Name	OS	Version	Free	VM	Accuracy	Recommended
Genymotion	Windows, Linux, macOS	3.0.0	✓ (Non-Dev Versions)	VirtualBox	High	✓
BlueStacks	Windows, macOS	4.60.2.1001	✓	QEMU (before v2.5) / VirtualBox (after v2.5)	High	✓
MEmu	Windows	6.2.1	✓	VirtualBox	High	✓
LDPlayer	Windows	3.60	✓	VirtualBox	High	✓
Nox App Player	Windows	6.2.8.0	✓	VirtualBox	High	✓
SmartGaGa	Windows	1.1.523	✓	VirtualBox	High	✓
MuMu App Player	Windows, macOS	1.1.0.2	✓	VirtualBox	High	✓
Peak App Player	Windows	1.2.5	✓	VirtualBox	High	✓
XePlayer	Windows	6.0.10	✓	VirtualBox	High	✓
KoPlayer	Windows	2.0.0	✓	VirtualBox	High	✓
tiantian app player	Windows	3.2.7	✓	VirtualBox	Mid	✗
Droid4X	Windows, macOS	0.10.7	✓	VirtualBox	High	✗
Andyroid	Windows, macOS	0.47.226.1076.7	✓	VmWare	High	✗
YouWave	Windows	5.11	✓	VirtualBox	Mid	✗
Android x86	Multi-platform	8.1-rc2	✓	VirtualBox, VMWare (for 3d acc)	Mid	✗
Android Studio	Windows, Linux	3.2.2	✓	QEMU	Low	✗
Anbox	Linux	Git	✓	Not an emulator (wine-like approach)	?	✓
Consoles
LineageOS	Nintendo Switch	15.1	✓	based of the Nvidia Shield TV build of LineageOS	?	✓
Abandoned/Discontinued
LeapDroid	Windows	1.8.0	✓	VirtualBox	High	✓
AMI DuOS	Windows	2.0.8.8511	✓	VirtualBox	Mid	✗
ARC Welder (Google Chrome)	Windows, Linux, macOS Chrome OS	50.5021.602.0	✓	Original	Mid	✗
Windroy	Windows	1.2	✓	Original	Low	✗
Shashlik	Linux	0.9.3	✓	Original	Low	✗
Project Astoria	Windows 10 Mobile	Discontinued	✗	Original	Low	✗
Xamarin Android Player	Windows, macOS	0.6.5	✗	VirtualBox	?	✗
Windroye	Windows	2.9.0	✓	VirtualBox	Mid	?

The VM column describes what backend technology the emulator uses. Emulators labeled with 'VirtualBox' sometimes needs the user to install Oracle VM VirtualBox. Usually, it is installed automatically.

Comparisons[edit]

Genymotion

A closed-source Android emulator with hardware-accelerated 3D graphics and USB host support, available for Windows, macOS, and Linux. In its latest versions, it has pretty good compatibility with commercial games. It's a commercial product though, aimed at software developers and QA teams. You'll need to create an account and download the free non-commercial use license available. Except for pay-to-remove 'free for personal use' watermark on the screen, paid builds to add features only useful for Android app developers.

Setting up the emulator itself is not too hard, but a bit of tinkering is required to add the Google Play store and ARM processor emulation (what you need essentially here to play the commercial releases) as well as Xbox 360 controller support. Not noob-friendly, but if you're experienced enough with Android to know your way around a rooted filesystem it shouldn't be too hard.

BlueStacks

Also commercial with a free option (requires a google account). It's less good than Genymotion and doesn't handle USB cable emulation. Previous versions used to come with an installer with adware comes with junk apps within the emulator and has a non-intuitive uninstaller, but that's no longer the case today. It includes Google Apps by default, though you'll need to install a file manager to copy game cache when loading your own .apk files.

MEmu

A free Android emulator with very good accuracy, sometimes outperforming BlueStacks.

LDPlayer

An Android emulator also with good accuracy. When testing games along side Nox, LDPlayer shows to have better performance/compatibility with games.

Droid4x

Has good accuracy but forcefully uninstalls VirtualBox, so it cannot co-exist with Genymotion and Xamarin. It's not recommended because it will install hidden background services (xunlei.exe, and Thunder.exe, both by the Chinese company which developed Droid4x) that seed Chinese torrents constantly and they are a pain to uninstall or deactivate (in case you've already fallen for it, use Revo Uninstaller).

Andyroid

Not recommended because it will install a cryptocurrency miner on your system without asking or informing about this to the user. Just like Genymotion, Andyroid uses VirtualBox, but with a twist: if it detects an installed VirtualBox during installation, it will delete it and will refuse to work. Beware!

DuOS

Not to be confused with a similarly-named Nintendo DS emulator by Roor, is a relative newcomer to the Android emulation market, made by American Megatrends i.e. the very same people behind the BIOS/UEFI firmware your PC may be using. Emulation is modest at best, with games and apps such as DraStic struggling on lower-end hardware. And to top it all off, it isn't free either.

Google Chrome

Can open .apk files using the ARC Welder extension, though their emulation on PC is average at best. Here's a compatibility list and a dedicated subreddit. Google has announced Play Store for Chrome OS, but it works on a different 'container' technology that is embedded in the Chrome OS. In addition, Google will discontinue Google Chrome apps on PC, so any major updates to ARC Welder for PC is unlikely.

Windroy

(Without the 'e' suffix) is a fast Android emulator that does not rely on VirtualBox or any similar technology. It isn't accurate though. While Google Play store can be installed with some tinkering, not many games can be installed (due to not faking device names) and will spawn multiple harmless-yet-annoying app_process.exe crashes. The official site is down since July 2016, so any updates are unlikely.

Windroye

(With the 'e' suffix) uses VirtualBox, but still offers better performance than BlueStacks. The Play Store is installed by default and has no stability issues found in Windroy. A related Reddit topic can be found here.

Android x86

An open-source project that aims to port the Android operating system to x86-based netbooks. Comes with Google Play and libhoudini (x86/ARM translation layer) installed. 3D acceleration works well both when installed directly on the machine as a local OS and also on VMware. VMware Player 15 supports emulating OpenGL ES 3 on the target and performance is quite good. VirtualBox 3d support is poor and probably won't work. Android x86 is continually being improved and can be tried fairly painlessly through VMware. Genymotion is (or at least used to be) a closed-source fork of Android x86, designed exclusively to be run on VirtualBox.

Anbox

A project that aims to run Android applications on Ubuntu distributions. Currently, it is on alpha state and only known to work on Ubuntu 16.04. Anbox requires custom kernel modules to run because unlike other emulators which emulate the whole Linux kernel, this one uses the host system's Linux kernel directly.

Shashlik

A project by KDE that aims to run Android applications on Linux using KDE5 and Qt5 technology. The project is infancy state and only known to run on latest Kubuntu versions. It currently lacks ARM processor emulation, so not many games will run. It is however known to play Flappy Bird and can show Spotify's login screen. It uses modified QEMU to emulate the Android operating system. Last major update was March 2016 and seems abandoned.

Xamarin Android Player

A newcomer to the Android emulation market. Not much is known about this because it required a minimum of $25/month subscription of main Xamarin products. The main Xamarin products were made available for free after the purchase by Microsoft, but Xamarin Android Player was discontinued.

Project Astoria

A Microsoft-developed Android emulator for Windows 10 Mobile included in several insider previews. It could run a few applications, though apps required Google Play Services did not run or had issues. This project was reportedly discontinued in November 2015 and its cancellation was confirmed on February 2016, so the emulator is not included in more recent versions of Windows 10 Mobile.

General Emulation issues[edit]

Lack of Release Notes and Update History information[edit]

While some emulators such as Genymotion do have version history on their website, most other emulators do not have such history pages, making it difficult to track updates as well as regressions.

Emulator Conflict[edit]

Many emulators, such as Droid4x, Andyroid, Genymotion, and Xamarin cannot co-exist on the same machine because they will uninstall each other. This can be a problem if one game runs only on one of these emulators but the other games do not work on it.

Google-related Libraries[edit]

Likely due to licensing issues, most Android emulators do not come with Google-related applications and related libraries preinstalled (Google Play Store, Play Services, Play Games client, etc) and requires the user to manually install them. Many games verify the existence of Google-related components at the start and refuse to work if some or any of them are missing.

ARM Applications[edit]

Most commercial games are developed and published only for devices with ARM CPUs such as most smartphones and tablets. However, the PCs we regularly use contain x86 CPUs, so these games cannot directly run. Some emulators like BlueStacks have ARM emulation by default, and in some others like Genymotion, it is possible to install ARM emulator manually. The ARM emulator requires Intel CPUs to work correctly and not guaranteed to work with all games.

Games with root/Custom ROMs/Emulator Detection[edit]

Many commercial games refuse to run if the device is 'rooted' (hacked to allow access to the deep portion of Android OS) in order to reduce cheating and pirating. If the emulator is rooted by default, it must be unrooted manually before the game can be played.

Some games are very aggressive that they detect Custom ROMs (unofficial firmware) or Android emulators (like the ones listed in this page) by the variety of ways like checking the existence and absence of system files in order to prevent the game from running in any unauthorized environments. These games are very difficult or plain impossible to play on emulators without resorting to cracked versions of the games. Solutions exist, like using MagiskSU (bundled with the Magisk flashable zip) and hiding root on anything Google Play related or installed apps that check for it.

Emulator Specific Issues[edit]

BlueStacks[edit]

• Can't root the device:

The latest Kingroot's .apk will do the job when loaded inside BlueStacks. It's that simple.

Alternatively, you could use Universal BlueStacks Rooting Software on an existing BlueStacks installation. Before opening it, go to the folder where BlueStacks is installed under Program Files, and run 'HD-Quit.exe' once.

Then, from the extracted 'BlueStacks RootEZ 32_64', open as administrator 'BlueStacks RootEZ.exe'. Click 'Automatic Detect from Installed Bluestacks', enable 'Enlarge System (Root.fs) Size to 400MB', and click 'I'm ready for Step 1'. A command-line window should appear. Now just wait until 'Preparing Complete' appears. Then, click 'Go for Step 2' and wait until 'Rooting is Complete' appears.

Close the application, and open the 'output' folder in the same directory as the extracted application. You should find a newly generated 'Root.fs' file. You can use it to replace the existing one under '%programdata%BlueStacksAndroid' (Press Windows+R and go there), but it's recommended to keep a backup of the original in case the new one causes Bluestacks to hang in the loading screen for more than a few minutes.

The package also includes Nova Explorer and Root Launcher. You may verify the rooting status with the 'Root Checker' app from Google Play. Considering some apps check for Google Play services for online checks, you can also install 'Modded Google Play Store', 'Lucky Patcher' and 'Magisk'.

Andyroid[edit]

• Unable To Launch VM Process:

On the taskbar, right-click Andyroid's notification icon, and choose Settings, Advanced, Set Andy Protocol. Type 'tcp' and confirm, then launch Andyroid.

Android-x86[edit]

• 3D Support is broken on VMWare when using newer kernels:

Kernels > 4.14 with version 8.1 break 3d acceleration in VMWare (see https://groups.google.com/forum/#!searchin/android-x86/4.9%7Csort:date/android-x86/wB65vJnuJiI/ytJaWYWUBwAJ). Use kernel 4.9 with 8.1 instead.

• Setting resolution in VMWare

Pass in a kernel option to grub when booting. Select the boot entry and then press 'e' to edit it, and then 'e' to edit again. Add the kernel option here. For example, to use a video resolution of 1920x1080, add 'video=1920x1080'. Press return to save the changes (for this boot session only), and 'b' to boot (the keys to edit and boot may be different depending on your grub version, there are usually instructions on the grub screen for the requisite keys)

See also[edit]

• Cellphone emulators - info on emulators for various feature phone/non-smartphone platforms.

Retrieved from 'http://emulation.gametechwiki.com/index.php?title=Android_emulators&oldid=30679'

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The slowness of the Android emulator has been the butt of many a joke since it was first unveiled. While Google has done a commendable job of making each iteration of the emulator faster, it is still painfully slow. Most Android developers simply debug to a device and avoid the headache. But that is still far from an ideal solution. I for one, don't want my phone tied to my dev box. Also when I give talks, it is nice to be able to easily project my work, holding my phone in the air for the audience is not an ideal solution.

I ran across a blog post by Chris Muir of Oracle, which offered a way out of emulator hell. The solution is to use a VirtualBox VM with Android on it instead of the Android emulator. Before you go all out and start putting together your own VM, be forewarned that entails a lot of work. You have to setup an x86 VM, deploy Android O/S to it, install software, etc. A lot of work. Luckily, the good folks at AndroVM have already done this work. The difference is amazing. I have tried it on both Mac and Windows.

Assumptions

This post is not to help you with setting up your Android development environment. I am assuming that your have already done that. The Android Device Bridge, which is included in the Android Developer Tools (ADT), should be installed and available on the command line (Windows) or terminal (Mac/Linux).

To begin, we need to download VirtualBox from VirtualBox.org. This is Oracle's excellent and free virtual machine app, and yeah I know a company named Innotek originally created it, then Sun bought them and Oracle bought Sun. Once you have VirtualBox installed proceed to AndroVM and download the VMs. My recommendation is to grab the following:

• androVM_vbox86tp_4.1.1_r6.1-20130222-gapps-houdini-flash.ova
• androVM_vbox86p_4.1.1_r6.1-20130222-gapps-houdini-flash.ova

These are the tablet (tp) and phone (p) versions of Android 4.1.1 with Google apps and other stuff. You will also be able to download, assuming you have a Google account, stuff from the Play Store. Once you have the VMs downloaded as OVA files you will need to import them.

With both VMs imported into VirtualBox I would recommend that you clone each and only use the cloned version. This is just a safety precaution against accidentally screwing up one of VMs.

To clone a VM simply right click it. Choose clone. Give the new machine a name. Mine's is x86Phone and x86Tablet, for the phone and tablet respectively. Choose the Full clone.