How to get broadcast ACTION_POWER_CONNECTED on And

Question

I am trying to make an app that shows some information when you connect your phone to a charger during a specific period of the day.

Before Android Oreo this was easy, just add an Broadcast receiver and add android.intent.action.ACTION_POWER_CONNECTED to the intentfilter in the manifest.

Now I am struggling to find a working solution to create the same functionality. I thought about periodically checking the device charging state but this feels wrong and it won't trigger immediately on connecting the device to a charger.

Registering the broadcast receiver from my application did not work either, when the application is closed the broadcast isn't received anymore.

Is there a battery friendly way to trigger an action when an Android device is connected to a charger in Android Oreo?

Answer 1

There are broadcasts which are exempted from the background execution limitations and for which broadcast receivers can still be registered in the manifest.

You could use the ACTION_BOOT_COMPLETED broadcast to start a service which registers a receiver for your ACTION_POWER_CONNECTED broadcast at runtime. (The service must be a foreground service. Otherwise, it may be destroyed.)

A other solution would be to use JobScheduler to create a job which requires charging. Then you don't need the foreground service.