Home/Tools
Tools we actually use
The list behind every measurement on this site. Names only, no links: version numbers move faster than pages and we would rather not publish a link that rots. All of these are free to use for development, and none of them require a rooted phone for the workflows described in our articles.
Build and toolchain
| Tool | Version we use | What it is for |
|---|
| Android NDK | r28 stable, r29 preview | C and C++ toolchain, headers and stub libraries. Pin the version per branch; r29 removes the legacy toolchain file. |
| CMake | 3.22 or newer | The build description we use in every sample. The NDK ships a toolchain file for it. |
| Ninja | 1.11 or newer | Generator for CMake. Noticeably faster than make on the same graph. |
| Gradle | 8.x with AGP 8 | Packages the native library and produces the bundle. Keep the native build out of it and call CMake from a task. |
| ccache | 4.x | Caches compiler output between builds. Worth it when you switch branches often; not worth it on a single clean build machine. |
| sccache | 0.8 | The same idea with a server and remote storage. Useful when several people build the same revision. |
Graphics
| Tool | Version we use | What it is for |
|---|
| Vulkan validation layers | SDK 1.3 | The first tool to enable on any new device. Sync validation has found every hazard we have shipped. |
| RenderDoc | 1.3x | Frame capture and inspection. Works with the layer packaged into a debug build; the Android path needs no root. |
| Android GPU Inspector | current | System profile and frame capture for supported devices. Good for counters that a desktop debugger cannot see. |
| Arm Performance Studio | current | Streamline and the Mali offline compiler. The compiler is useful even without a Mali device, for instruction counts. |
| Snapdragon Profiler | current | Vendor counters on Qualcomm devices. The only practical way to see some GPU stalls on that hardware. |
| glslang and shaderc | current | Offline shader compilation to SPIR-V. Compile at build time and ship the binary; do not parse GLSL on the phone. |
Profiling
| Tool | Version we use | What it is for |
|---|
| Perfetto | current | System trace: scheduling, frequency, frame timeline. The one tool we use on every device, including retail phones. |
| simpleperf | NDK | Sampling profiler for native code. Produces a call graph that maps back to your symbols. |
| Tracy | 0.11 | Frame profiler with a client library in your build. Its timeline view is the fastest way to see a long frame's shape. |
| ATrace | platform | In-app markers, read by Perfetto and by the platform's own tools. Cheap enough to leave enabled in release builds. |
| FrameTimeline | API 31+ | The system's own view of when a frame was presented. Use it to check what the player actually saw. |
Audio
| Tool | Version we use | What it is for |
|---|
| Oboe | 1.9 | C++ wrapper over AAudio and OpenSL ES. The stream builder handles the fallback path so your code does not. |
| AAudio | API 26+ | The platform API. Use it directly if Android 8 is your minimum and you do not need Oboe's helpers. |
| OboeTester | current | The reference app for latency and glitch testing. Its loopback measurement is the method behind our numbers. |
Memory
| Tool | Version we use | What it is for |
|---|
| heapprofd | Perfetto | Native heap profiling with call stacks, on a production build if you can afford the slowdown. |
| HWAddressSanitizer | NDK | Catches use-after-free and buffer overflows in native code. Debug builds only; the overhead is large. |
| mimalloc | 2.x | The allocator we use for engine allocations, with a per-frame arena on top. |
| dumpsys meminfo | platform | Per-category memory for a running process. The first command to run when a report says “memory”. |
Packaging
| Tool | Version we use | What it is for |
|---|
| bundletool | 1.17 | Builds and inspects APK sets from a bundle. The only way to see what a device will actually download. |
| apkanalyzer | current | Summary, size and dex information for an APK. Fast enough to run in a pre-commit hook. |
| zipalign | NDK build tools | Alignment, including the 16 KB page option for newer devices. Run it on the final artefact, not an intermediate one. |
What is missing
Three tools are absent on purpose. A commercial engine profiler, because the articles are about the platform and not about one engine. A crash reporting service, because we do not run one and would not recommend a choice we have not measured. And any “one-click optimiser”, because the only reliable optimisation is the one you can measure before and after.