About Shelter
This app requires Device Admin permissions to work. If you question what it does with the permission, please read or audit the source code, you can also build from the source code on your own. Shelter is a Free and...
This app requires Device Admin permissions to work. If you question what it does with the permission, please read or audit the source code, you can also build from the source code on your own.
Shelter is a Free and Open-Source (FOSS) app that leverages the “Work Profile” feature of Android to provide an isolated space that you can install or clone apps into.
Shelter comes with absolutely no advertisement / statistics / tracking SDKs bundled with it. All source code is available in at https://git.angry.im/PeterCxy/Shelter or mirror https://github.com/PeterCxy/Shelter and the sources are licensed under WTFPL.
This app depends on your Android system’s implementation of Work Profile. Some vendor / custom ROMs may have a broken implementation that may cause crashes and even bricking of your device. One such example is MIUI from Xiaomi. I currently provide no support for such ROMs because I personally do not own any of these devices. If you are running Shelter on these ROMs, you are on your own. If any developer out there own these devices and could make Shelter run on these ROMs, please send pull requests and I’ll be happy to merge them.
Features / Use Cases
===
- Run apps inside the isolated profile so they cannot access your data outside the profile
- “Freeze” (disable) background-heavy or seldom-used apps when you don’t need them. This is especially true if you use apps from "some company".
- Clone apps to use two accounts on one device
Caveats
===
Shelter is not a full sandbox implementation. It cannot protect you from:
- Security bugs of the Android system or Linux kernel
- Backdoors installed in your Android system (so please use an open-source ROM if you are concerned about this)
- Backdoors installed into the firmwares (no way to work around this)
- Any other bugs or limitations imposed by the Android system.
Also, Shelter cannot create more than 1 work profile on one Android device, and cannot co-exist with any other apps that manages a Work Profile. This is due to the limitations of the Android system, and I can do nothing about this.
FAQS
===
Q: Why not use Island by OasisFeng, the creator of Greenify?
A: Simply because it is not an FOSS app and it bundles with non-free SDKs. Note that this doesn’t necessarily mean that Island has anti-features like tracking (and I don’t think it has either), it’s just that I wrote Shelter as an FOSS replacement of it. There is no other reason why one would prefer Shelter over Island except for this one.
Q: Why does Shelter always run in background?
A: Please try removing Shelter from “Recent Apps” every time you close it. If it still persists in your notifications and eating up battery, you might have encountered a bug. Please file a bug report.
Q: How do I uninstall Shelter from my device?
Q: If I encounter bugs, how do I report them?
A: You could file an issue on either the main repository at https://git.angry.im/PeterCxy/Shelter or the mirror repository at https://github.com/PeterCxy/Shelter. Please include your system information as well as a logcat if possible.
Previous Versions
Here you can find the changelog of Shelter since it was posted on our website on 2021-12-16 11:32:05.
The latest version is 1.6 and it was updated on 2026-06-10 06:45:12. See below the changes in each version.
Shelter version 1.6-google
Updated At: 2020-09-29
Changes: - Added support for Android 11
- Allows blocking contacts access across profile boundary
- More translations; you can now participate in translating Shelter at https://weblate.typeblog.net
- For the full changelog, please see https://cgit.typeblog.net/Shelter/tree/CHANGELOG.md
Disclaimer
Official Google Play Link
We do not host Shelter on our servers. We did not scan it for viruses, adware, spyware or other type of malware. This app is hosted by Google and passed their terms and conditions to be listed there. We recommend caution when installing it.
The Google Play link for Shelter is provided to you by apps112.com without any warranties, representations or guarantees of any kind, so access it at your own risk.
If you have questions regarding this particular app contact the publisher directly. For questions about the functionalities of apps112.com contact us.
