Optimising Android apps for Tecno and Infinix devices

Tecno, Itel and Infinix account for over 40% of smartphones sold in Africa. If your app is not optimised for their hardware constraints, you are losing a massive portion of your potential market.

Understanding the hardware

The most popular devices in Nigeria, Kenya and Ghana typically have 2-3GB of RAM, octa-core processors running at 1.6-2.0GHz, 64-128GB internal storage and 4000-5000mAh batteries.

These are capable devices but they run Android Go or near-stock Android with aggressive memory management. The OS will kill background processes aggressively when RAM is under pressure.

Common performance problems

Heavy image loading is the most common issue. Using full-resolution images without compression on a device with limited RAM causes out of memory errors. Use Glide or Coil with appropriate size targets.

Memory leaks are amplified on low-RAM devices. A leak that is unnoticeable on a Pixel 8 will crash a Tecno Spark 8 within minutes of use. Use LeakCanary during development.

Background services are killed aggressively. Do not rely on background services for critical functionality. Use WorkManager for deferred work and accept that it may be delayed.

Measuring the impact

Use Unilitix to segment your analytics by device model. Compare session length, crash rate and funnel completion between high-end and low-end devices. The gap is usually larger than teams expect.

Unilitix.identify(userId, mapOf(
  "deviceModel" to Build.MODEL,
  "deviceBrand" to Build.BRAND,
  "ramGB" to getAvailableRam()
))

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