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Can mobile web applications run in the background? (iOS and Android)

Can mobile web applications run in the background? I am mainly interested in iOS and Android.

Thanks!

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5 answers

No, they cannot. On Android, you could install a different browser, but this is not possible in stock. @jgillman points to the sound exception in iOS, but this is the only exception I know of.

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Since this is a situation that changes almost daily, I will send an updated answer. This applies to recent releases of these browsers, but may change tomorrow!

My music app is HTML5 and needs to be run in the background. Support for this depends on the mobile browser.

  • Safari on iOS: Continues playing one or two songs in the background
  • Android Native Browser: will play one song and then stop
  • Firefox on Android: stops when the screen locks or browser lose focus or song.
  • Dolphin on Android: plays in the background, but eventually stops
  • Opera on Android: great background support! Javascript continues to work, and music continues to play even when the screen is turned off or Opera goes to the background. Opera even switches play / pause to the notification page. Yay

Here is a related SO issue.

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iOS allows you to play sound from a web application (Mobile Safari) in the background. However, I do not know about other events.

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You cannot start a web application in the background. To enable most of the built-in functions, you must develop your own application.

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During this answer, Firefox mobile and Opera mobile for Android let javascript run in the background, even if the screen is locked.

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