# Revision of restrictions on background work from Android 5.0 to 13

DevFeed: [Revision of restrictions on background work from Android 5.0 to 13](<https://devfeed.tech/articles/revision-of-restrictions-on-background-work-from-android-5-0-to-13-25961.md>)

Original publisher: [Read original article](<https://medium.com/its-tinkoff/android-background-restrictions-b63e73fe508?source=rss-7a0a233f88a2------2>)

Author: Kirill Rozov

Published: 2022-11-29T12:54:28Z

Content type: article

Language: en

Sources: [Stories by Kirill Rozov on Medium](<https://devfeed.tech/sources/stories-by-kirill-rozov-on-medium.md>)

Topics: [Android](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/android.md>), [Utility Software](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/utility.md>), [Google](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/google.md>), [Google Play](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/google-play.md>)

Tags: [android](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/android.md>), [android-app-development](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/android-app-development.md>), [androiddev](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/androiddev.md>), [background-work](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/background-work.md>), [battery](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/battery.md>), [firebase](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/firebase.md>), [google](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/google.md>), [google-play](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/google-play.md>), [notifications](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/notifications.md>), [permissions](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/permissions.md>), [services](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/services.md>), [sync](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/sync.md>)

## AI overview

The article reviews how Android background-work restrictions evolved from Android 5.0 through Android 13. It describes earlier background tools, including Alarm Manager, Broadcast Intent, services, Sync Adapter, and Download Manager, and explains that system-performance concerns led to tighter constraints involving background execution, battery use, file-system access, and permissions.

## Source excerpt

Background restrictions in Android Once upon a time, running in the background was easy. Now Android has a lot of restrictions: running in the background, access to the file system, permissions that need to be approved by Google Play moderators, and others. Developers have to work with all of them. Let's remember where it all started and how the requirements changed with each new version of Android How it started Before Android 5.0, we had the set of tools to run tasks in the background: Alarm Manager. The tool that allows you to set an alarm on your system and receive notifications. Broadcast Intent. It sends notifications about events that are happening on the system (new messages, for example). Service -- Background, Foreground & Bound. Sync Adapter. A special ancient stuff, which is connected to account management for data synchronization. A clear example: when you set up a Google account in Android, you can set up synchronization of your calendar, contacts and other services. Under the hood, it works through the Sync Adapter. The tool has not lived up to our days. Download Manager. A utility that allows you to download files. It is not very smart, but it is simple and convenient. Google Play, for example, is what downloads files with it. The problems appeared because developers did not follow Spider-Man's rule: "With great opportunities for developers comes responsibility for the speed of the system". Google gave them huge opportunities from the first versions of Android, but did not warn them that they were working in a system that was responsible for quality. When users broke something, they didn't blame third-party developers, they said, "Android is lagging, but everything is fast on the iPhone." It turned out that the developers were good and Google was bad. Google decided to deal with this, but to do this, they had to find "enemies" affecting the quality of applications. They turned out to be: Battery size vs. device size. Everyone wants a thin device that