Will Application.onCreate(Bundle) be called before BroadcastReceiver.onReceive(..)?

Question

Just wanted to verify that Application.onCreate() is guaranteed to be called prior to BroadcastReceiver.onReceive() ? Let say you are waiting for BOOT broadcast or SMS broadcast, can you be sure that Application.onCreate() has already been called once before you reach BroadcastReceiver.onReceive()? Thanks

Answer 1

Old question, however I can provide an updated answer and actual test results.

Originally I assumed so and set my application onCreate() to save app context first, like so:

@Override
public void onCreate()
{
    myapp.app_context = this;

    super.onCreate();

Now I got a receiver declared so:

    <receiver android:name=".myreceiver"
        android:permission="android.permission.RECEIVE_BOOT_COMPLETED">
        <intent-filter>
            <action android:name="android.intent.action.BOOT_COMPLETED" />
        </intent-filter>
        <intent-filter>
            <action android:name="android.intent.action.MY_PACKAGE_REPLACED" />
        </intent-filter>
    </receiver>

And in on receive:

@Override
public void onReceive(Context context, Intent intent)
{
    ctx = myapp.app_context;

Got a stack trace showing ctx (myapp.app_context) is NULL! Got 1 on an Android 6 Galaxy J7 device and 1 on an Android 9 Xperia XZ1.

Answer 2

The docs tell us the following:

public void onCreate ()

Called when the application is starting, before any activity, service, or receiver objects (excluding content providers) have been created.

Found here: http://developer.android.com/reference/android/app/Application.html

Answer 3

public void onReceive(Context context, Intent intent) If you register a static receiver, the context is the app otherwise it is the context where you call registerReceiver with