Where is the temp folder on Android devices?

Question

Where is the temp folder located on Android phones?

What do you mean by temp folder, generally Android applications have their own isolated storage provided by the system. What are you storing in a 'temp' folder? — Quintin Robinson, Mar 02 '10 at 16:31
It might be good to migrate this question to https://android.stackexchange.com — pevik, Jan 17 '18 at 05:39
@pevik No, because we are talking about file-only temp directories. Something that is used in development. — Gaurav Mall, Aug 25 '19 at 08:46
@GauravMall but https://android.stackexchange.com/ is IMHO also for development. At least there are similar questions. — pevik, Aug 26 '19 at 16:50
@pevik Well, could be. Anyways I don't agree. That's okay you can have a different opinion on the matter :) — Gaurav Mall, Aug 26 '19 at 18:06

starfry · Answer 1 · 2016-12-13T08:59:06.840

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The temporary directory is /data/local/tmp.

I've seen some comments that claim you need to be rooted to access it but I'm not sure that's true. Whilst it is true that you need root to freely access /data, this is not required for /data/local/tmp.

I have verified this on Android 5.1.1.

edited Dec 13 '16 at 08:59

answered Dec 12 '16 at 16:46

starfry

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Tested on Android 4.x and 7.x and on both it's working fine. It's possible to create subdirectories (using `adb shell`) and store screenshots in that temp directory and then pull them from the device using `adb`. Tested on non-rooted devices. – David Ferenczy Rogožan Dec 01 '17 at 14:02
How about is the premission? Will it be accessed by any app? – Yeung Mar 31 '20 at 05:17

score 14 · Answer 2 · answered Feb 14 '11 at 13:03

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I believe what you're looking for is getCacheDir()!

answered Feb 14 '11 at 13:03

Hein du Plessis

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cache ≠ tmp, caches are useful to store around, whereas temp files are meant to be deleted. – Alexander Jul 07 '14 at 19:48
Android has the functions File.createTempFile() and File.createTempDirectory(), but they also create files in Context.getCacheDir() – lexa-b Sep 28 '17 at 09:40
And how can i call this function? – 12431234123412341234123 Dec 02 '20 at 13:44

score 10 · Accepted Answer · answered Mar 02 '10 at 16:39

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Reading this post from the android developers google group leads me to believe that there is not 1 global temp directory, and each application is expected to maintain their own temporary files.

answered Mar 02 '10 at 16:39

snctln

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Link is dead/spam/banned – Johan Nov 02 '17 at 09:02
See here: https://www.quora.com/Where-should-I-find-temp-files-in-Android-mobiles – JFreeman Feb 19 '19 at 05:43

score 2 · Answer 4 · edited Jun 15 '23 at 06:45

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The files downloaded using createTempFile() are stored in folder:

/data/data/YOURapp/cache/

edited Jun 15 '23 at 06:45

Phil Dukhov

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answered Nov 03 '20 at 14:46

tariq101

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Where is the temp folder on Android devices?

4 Answers4

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