# Tinder cuts app cold starts by 47% with new R8 Configuration Analyzer

DevFeed: [Tinder cuts app cold starts by 47% with new R8 Configuration Analyzer](<https://devfeed.tech/articles/tinder-cuts-app-cold-starts-by-47-with-new-r8-configuration-analyzer-22698.md>)

Original publisher: [Read original article](<http://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/08/tinder-app-cold-start-r8-configuration-analyzer.html>)

Author: Android Developers (noreply@blogger.com)

Published: 2026-08-18T18:00:00Z

Content type: article

Language: en

Sources: [Android Developers Blog](<https://devfeed.tech/sources/android-developers-blog-3.md>)

Topics: [R8](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/r8.md>), [Android](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/android.md>), [Optimization](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/optimization.md>), [configuration](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/configuration.md>), [audit](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/audit.md>)

Tags: [android](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/android.md>), [anr](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/anr.md>), [audit](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/audit.md>), [configuration](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/configuration.md>), [metrics](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/metrics.md>), [obfuscation](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/obfuscation.md>), [optimization](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/optimization.md>), [r8](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/r8.md>)

## AI overview

This developer case study explains how Tinder used the R8 Configuration Analyzer to identify and remove keep-rule blockers in its Android application. The reported results were a 47% reduction in cold-start time, a 28.98% reduction in download size to 61.5 MB, and a 28% reduction in user-perceived ANRs. The article also describes analyzer metrics for shrinking, optimization, and obfuscation, along with an R8 Analyzer skill for agentic development workflows.

## Source excerpt

Posted by Ajesh R Pai, Developer Relations Engineer, Ulises Uriel Verduzco Diaz, Software Engineer, Tinder, and Tracy Agyemang, Product Marketing Manager Tinder is on a mission to power and inspire real connections by making meeting easy and fun for every new generation of singles. However, as their Android application codebase grew in size, so did its complexity. Prior to their latest optimization efforts, approximately 70% of the application was not optimized, carrying 17 dex files,including three dedicated just to startup. Although they had enabled R8, much of its optimization potential was blocked due to keep rules, and the team was unable to identify which specific rules were preventing optimization. To reduce startup time and decrease user-perceived Application Not Responding (ANR) errors, Tinder turned to the new R8 Configuration Analyzer to tackle these challenges. By utilizing the R8 Configuration Analyzer, Tinder successfully identified and removed unintentional optimization blockers. The results were immediate and impactful: Tinder achieved a 47% reduction in app cold starts, shrank their app download size by 28.98% (down to 61.5 MB), and reduced user-perceived ANRs by 28%. Configuration analyzer The R8 Configuration Analyzer shows R8 optimization by tracking shrinking, optimization, and obfuscation scores to show available refinement areas. It shows the broad, redundant, or obsolete keep rules, including those from external libraries so that you can analyse the keep rule impact and refine the keep rules. Key metrics shown in Configuration Analyzer include: Shrinking Score: Code percentage available for R8 shrinking. Optimization Score: Code percentage open to optimization (for example, method inlining, horizontal class merging). Obfuscation Score: Percentage of classes, methods and fields that can be renamed by R8 to decrease size. Use the analyzer to audit keep rules and their impacts: Find broad rules: Narrow the scope of package-wide rules that restri