Run Android emulator without GUI (headless Android

Question

How can I run emulator without GUI (headless Android)?

My requirement is to run the headless Android on the emulator. Is it correct if I use ro.config.headless 1? Or disable zygote?

Answer 1

One of the options to achieve that is to stop zygote service when an emulator running. When stopping the zygote process (aka app_process) all of the system services, that were forked from zygote at system boot, shuts down. Only a few native system services will be running. The emulator's display should show the startup logo (or animation).

The steps for stopping zygote are as follows:

• adb shell
• su (most of emulator images have /system/xbin/su)
• stop zygote

After that you can explore how less services are running with service list. Critical for Android Runtime services will be stopped, e.g.

activity: [] // ActivityManager
package: [] // PackageManager
display: [] // DisplayManager
...

To start zygote execute:

• start zygote

Note: with the @CommonsWare's solution you are still going to have zygote and most of the Android system services running.

Answer 2

From: http://paulemtz.blogspot.com/2013/05/android-testing-in-headless-emulator.html

Then, to run the headless emulator:

emulator -avd test -no-skin -no-audio -no-window

The '-no-skin' option removes the emulator buttons such as the home and other hardware keyboard buttons.

The '-no-audio' option disables the audio support.

Finally, the '-no-window' option disables the emulator's graphical window display.

Note that -avd test would need to be modified to refer to your specific emulator image (AVD).