Desired Capabilities for Android

Since Appium caters to both Android and iOS, there are different set of desired capabilities for Android and iOS.

This section will list all the desired capabilities associated with Android. Majority of them are optional but you can choose to use them as it suits your needs.The one's in bold are required for initial kick-off

Capability	Description	Values
appActivity	Activity name for the Android activity you want to launch from your package	MainActivity, .Settings
appPackage	Java package of the Android app you want to run	com.example.android.myApp, com.android.settings
appWaitActivity	Activity name for the Android activity you want to wait for	SplashActivity
appWaitPackage	Java package of the Android app you want to wait for	com.example.android.myApp, com.android.settings
deviceReadyTimeout	Timeout in seconds while waiting for device to become ready	5
androidCoverage	Fully qualified instrumentation class. Passed to -w in adb shell am instrument -e coverage true -w	com.my.Pkg/com.my.Pkg.instrumentation.MyInstrumentation
enablePerformanceLogging	(Chrome and webview only) Enable Chromedriver’s performance logging (default false)	true, false
androidDeviceReadyTimeout	Timeout in seconds used to wait for a device to become ready after booting	e.g., 30
androidDeviceSocket	Devtools socket name. Needed only when tested app is a Chromium embedding browser. The socket is open by the browser and Chromedriver connects to it as a devtools client.	e.g., chrome_devtools_remote
avd	Name of avd to launch	e.g., api19
avdLaunchTimeout	How long to wait in milliseconds for an avd to launch and connect to ADB (default 120000)	300000
avdReadyTimeout	How long to wait in milliseconds for an avd to finish its boot animations (default 120000)	300000
avdArgs	Additional emulator arguments used when launching an avd	e.g., -netfast
useKeystore	Use a custom keystore to sign apks, default false	true or false
keystorePath	Path to custom keystore, default ~/.android/debug.keystore	e.g., /path/to.keystore
keystorePassword	Password for custom keystore	e.g., foo
keyAlias	Alias for key	e.g., androiddebugkey
keyPassword	Password for key	e.g., foo
chromedriverExecutable	The absolute local path to webdriver executable (if Chromium embedder provides its own webdriver, it should be used instead of original chromedriver bundled with Appium)	/abs/path/to/webdriver
specialChromedriverSessionArgs	Custom arguments passed directly to chromedriver in chromeOptions capability. Passed as object which properties depend on a specific webdriver.	e.g., {'androidDeviceSocket': 'opera_beta_devtools_remote',}
autoWebviewTimeout	Amount of time to wait for Webview context to become active, in ms. Defaults to 2000	e.g. 4
intentAction	Intent action which will be used to start activity (default android.intent.action.MAIN)	e.g.android.intent.action.MAIN, android.intent.action.VIEW
intentCategory	Intent category which will be used to start activity (default android.intent.category.LAUNCHER)	e.g. android.intent.category.LAUNCHER, android.intent.category.APP_CONTACTS
intentFlags	Flags that will be used to start activity (default 0x10200000)	e.g. 0x10200000
optionalIntentArguments	Additional intent arguments that will be used to start activity. See Intent arguments	e.g. --esn, --ez, etc.
unicodeKeyboard	Enable Unicode input, default false	true or false
resetKeyboard	Reset keyboard to its original state, after running Unicode tests with unicodeKeyboard capability. Ignored if used alone. Default false	true or false

If you notice above some of the capabilities like appWaitActivity , avd, androidDeviceReadyTimeout are very handy and would be recommended to make use of in your automation suite.