How to remove unneeded permissions on Ionic 5 capacitor Android app?

Question

I am setting up my first Ionic React app. I created an app with Ionic 5 and used the In-app Purchase 2 plugin.

I wanted to test this, so I uploaded the signed APK to the Play Store.

When I check the app bundle details on the Play Store, I see that it requires several unneeded permissions:

Required permissions (13)

android.permission.ACCESS_COARSE_LOCATION, android.permission.ACCESS_FINE_LOCATION, android.permission.ACCESS_NETWORK_STATE, android.permission.CAMERA, android.permission.INTERNET, android.permission.MODIFY_AUDIO_SETTINGS, android.permission.READ_EXTERNAL_STORAGE, android.permission.RECEIVE_BOOT_COMPLETED, android.permission.RECORD_AUDIO, android.permission.WAKE_LOCK, android.permission.WRITE_EXTERNAL_STORAGE, com.android.vending.BILLING, com.google.android.c2dm.permission.RECEIVE

For example, it doesn't need ACCESS_COARSE_LOCATION, RECORD_AUDIO, READ_EXTERNAL_STORAGE, and so on.

I didn't set any of this up; apparently "Capacitor apps ship with all the core plugins included."

How do I remove these?

Answer 1

The permissions are stored in /android/app/src/main/AndroidManifest.xml. You can delete them and then rebuild the app to remove them.

Answer 2

I'm using cordova, and the plugin fileOpener2 uses the permission REQUEST_INSTALL_PACKAGES, however it isn't necessary in my app context.

so I had do write a hack, that removes this line from /android/app/src/main/AndroidManifest.xml just after the command cordova prepare.

Those commands are located in a build.sh that I use to generate the app version targeting each environment.

sed '/REQUEST_INSTALL_PACKAGES/d' platforms/android/app/src/main/AndroidManifest.xml > platforms/android/app/src/main/AndroidManifest_new.xml 
rm -rf platforms/android/app/src/main/AndroidManifest.xml
mv platforms/android/app/src/main/AndroidManifest_new.xml platforms/android/app/src/main/AndroidManifest.xml

hope it helps you!