CMD stuck on "Waiting for emulator..."

Question

C:\hello>cordova emulate android
Running command: C:\hello\platforms\android\cordova\run.bat --emulator
ANDROID_HOME=C:\Users\user\AppData\Local\Android\sdk
JAVA_HOME=C:\Program Files\Java\jdk1.7.0_10
WARNING : no emulator specified, defaulting to Nexus_5_API_22_x86
Waiting for emulator...

It stays there for ever and does nothing.

See Maxim Mazurok's answer below: there are multiple emulator.exe files in the Android SDK and the correct one needs to be first in the PATH environment variable. — AlwaysLearning, Jul 21 '20 at 23:58

Tomas Antos · Answer 1 · 2016-05-23T14:12:21.743

17

I had the same problem. Though cordova started the emulator, the command line kept on saying 'Waiting for emulator...' forever.

The trick is, before running the command:

cordova run android

make sure you navigate into the android platform folder. That is, don't run the command from within the

    /project folder

but instead from within

    /project/platforms/android folder

That will launch your application in the Android emulator

edited May 23 '16 at 14:12

answered May 23 '16 at 14:06

Tomas Antos

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I found `cordova run android` works in the `/[project]/platforms/android` folder, but after the first run it also works in `/[project]`... – Chris Jun 02 '16 at 21:56
Thanks. Didn't know that. – Tomas Antos Jun 06 '16 at 07:03
Worked for me as well. Strange one that. – realnsleo Jan 22 '18 at 12:33
1

didn't change the problem for me :-( (but on-device worked instantly) – amenthes Apr 11 '18 at 13:45
3

Thanks, but it didn't help me unfortunately :( – Kashif Nazar Oct 11 '18 at 06:19

score 17 · Answer 2 · answered Apr 12 '18 at 11:23

I did fix it by disabling the AVD Quick boot.

It seems Cordova was expecting an event not sent when the virtual device is re-launched form quick boot.

Go into the AVD Manager
edit your favorite Virtual Device
Show Advanced settings
Boot option: Cold Boot

score 16 · Answer 3 · answered Mar 15 '18 at 18:35

16

I can't guarantee that my problem is exactly the same as yours, but I fix this by simple loading another app on the emulator (e.g. Messenger). At that point the emulator seems to perform some sort of context-menu click inside the app I just loaded and my Cordova app runs fine.

I have honestly no idea why this happens, but this fix works for me.

answered Mar 15 '18 at 18:35

Chris Rae

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Cloud you add some more details on how to do this? Thank you. – Stefan Aug 20 '19 at 18:57
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Just click in the emulator itself to start another app. – Chris Rae Aug 20 '19 at 22:02

score 11 · Answer 4 · answered Jun 12 '16 at 16:16

11

Starting the Emulator from the AVD Manager and executing cordova emulate android while the emulator is still running solved the problem for me.

I executed the command from within the /platforms/android folder, like Tomas Antos suggested. Not sure if that had an effect.

answered Jun 12 '16 at 16:16

Waog

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it solved problem for me too. emulator must be started to start app – Kalreg Feb 01 '17 at 10:25
This worked for me, except I ran `cordova run android`. No more `Waiting for emulator to start...` message. The already open emulator loaded my app. – OXiGEN Jul 14 '19 at 21:51
omg thanks man.. i couldnt freaking remember what AVD manager was but this helped me lol.. needed to open it from android studio – THE AMAZING Oct 12 '21 at 23:09

score 9 · Answer 5 · answered Apr 20 '20 at 08:37

9

Found solution for Windows:

Make sure that you have PATH_TO_SDK\emulator in your environment variable PATH
Make sure that it's higher than PATH_TO_SDK\tools

See details to debug if this doesn't work for you:

You can debug by going to platforms\android\cordova\lib\emulator.js and looking for spawn('emulator'. Then, you can log the exact command like so:

console.log(`cd ${emulator_dir}`, '&&', 'emulator', ...args);

In my case, it was:

cd C:\Users\Maxim.Mazurok\AppData\Local\Android\tools && emulator -avd wtg -port 5584

and was giving this error: PANIC: Missing emulator engine program for 'x86' CPU.

After I changed my PATH, it became:

cd C:\Users\Maxim.Mazurok\AppData\Local\Android\emulator && emulator -avd wtg -port 5584

answered Apr 20 '20 at 08:37

Maxim Mazurok

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This should be the correct answer. Thank you, I can't believe how much time I wasted on this. If you run `where emulator` from a CMD prompt it should list `%ANDROID_SDK_ROOT%\emulator\emulator.exe` before `%ANDROID_SDK_ROOT%\tools\emulator.exe`. Why are there even two `emulator.exe` programs in the SDK? – AlwaysLearning Jul 21 '20 at 23:50
@AlwaysLearning thank you :) "the tools/emulator is a work around for older studio" [source](https://issuetracker.google.com/issues/66886035#comment2) – Maxim Mazurok Jul 21 '20 at 23:56
@AlwaysLearning - Yup. It's an issue with having an old android SDK installed, and it not being removed after being updated. This is the definitive fix for this issue once and for all. Opening the emulator manually before running the command works too, but this gives the Cordova intended behaviour. – Jack_Hu May 30 '21 at 17:43

score 8 · Answer 6 · answered Jun 17 '15 at 01:07

8

Have you managed to solve this? If you haven't then, I suggest you to check what are the AVD (Android Virtual Device) available. You might see an error message in the AVD manager. Start all the vitrual devices you see there.

If you get the error:

emulator: ERROR: x86 emulation currently requires hardware acceleration! Please ensure Intel HAXM is properly installed and usable. CPU acceleration status: HAX kernel module is not installed!

Then, open your Android SDK Manager and install intel x86 Emulator Accelerator (HAXM installer) under extras.

That should solve the problem

answered Jun 17 '15 at 01:07

Kiong

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I started using a real phone instead of an emulator to get rid of the problem. ^^ – sleepless_in_seattle Jun 17 '15 at 15:01
Awesome. I had to solve this cause I was using genymotion for it :) *no access to the specific device which i need. – Kiong Jun 18 '15 at 06:56
i'm having this issue, though HAXM is installed. – Moax6629 Sep 17 '15 at 05:12
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intel x86 Emulator Accelerator (HAXM installer) is not compatible with window – kritikaTalwar Mar 25 '17 at 12:19
@kritikaTalwar, my development at the time of this question was in Windows. It works up to windows 8.1 for me though (Didn't try windows 10 yet) – Kiong Mar 26 '17 at 03:05
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I had to turn the Intel VT-x ON (enabled) in BIOS and then i worked. – Dawid Ohia Sep 28 '18 at 09:59
I'm not sure this is quite the same issue - when the HAXM error gets thrown the emulator exits with the error code. What the OP has is just "waiting for emulator" forever. – Chris Rae Apr 01 '20 at 04:26

score 4 · Answer 7 · answered Apr 08 '18 at 19:32

This question is a little bit old, but I have found another way, if the cli is stuck in:

Waiting for emulator to boot (this may take a while)....

In my case the emulator is already running and I can use the emulated device, but the upload didnt work.

Simply turn the emulated device off by holding the On/Off button until android asks for "Power off". After the shutdown you try booting again and then it worked for me. Hope this helps you in the future.

score 3 · Answer 8 · answered Jul 21 '19 at 18:06

I just had that same problem, and after trying many ways, i succeeded by doing this: - Launch AVD Manager, wipe Data and click on Cold Boot Now and wait until emulation is done - Then you go back to your editor and try "cordova run android" again in the terminal. By doing that i got the message :

Using apk: C:\xampp\htdocs\Apps Mobile\xxx\xxxx\platforms\android\app\build\outputs > \apk\debug\app-debug.apk Package name: com.example.xxx INSTALL SUCCESS LAUNCH SUCCESS

and the project app was launched on the emulator.

score 2 · Answer 9 · answered Jul 12 '18 at 00:04

What I did to solve and how you can debug yours also

1) Open Android Studio
2) Click Help->Find Action and type "AVD Manager"
3) Create a new AVD using API 26 (at the time of writing this)
4) Once it's created click the play button to try to run it.
5) If it doesn't run it should print an error to the console... you need to resolve every error it prints until you can get it to run via android studio. Once you get it working there it will work with cordova emulate run.

To get mine to work I
1) had add to add a new environment variable called ANDROID_SDK_ROOT and point it to the correct location (in my case D:\Android\android-sdk)
2) Install Intel x86 Emulator Accelerator (HAXM installer) from the SDK Manager
3) Navigate to D:\AppData\Local\Android\Sdk\extras\intel\Hardware_Accelerated_Execution_Manager and run intelhaxm-android.exe
4) I got an error about hyper-v. IF YOU RUN DOCKER YOU HAD TO INSTALL HYPER-V. YOU NEED TO DISABLE IT TO RUN THE ANDROID EMULATOR!!
5) Once I disabled hyper-v and redid step 3 my emulator worked!

score 1 · Answer 10 · answered Jun 22 '16 at 10:45

Here is what I did to solve mine:

When the simulator launches, go to the open apps (in the android emulator), and close everything there. Chances are, cordova has launched at least once before, and this running instance prevents it from launching again.
Exit the emulator.
Cancel the command line and then try to launch the app again.

score 1 · Answer 11 · answered Jun 01 '17 at 21:58

I have followed what Kiong answered.

Sharing all my steps (with prints), in my case I opened Android Studio and then, in the menu, navigated through Tools -> Android -> AVD Manager.

As seen at the image below, I had a message that "Android Emulator is incompatible with Hyper-V."

I have followed the steps suggested (as below):

Unfortunately, you cannot have Hyper-V running and use the emulator. Here is what you can do:

Start a command prompt as Administrator

Run the following command: C:\Windows\system32> bcdedit /set hypervisorlaunchtype off

Reboot your machine.

After the system reboot, I opened the same window (AVD Manager), and a next warning was available, to install HAXM:

After that, the emulator started, but very slow. The next suggestion was to install a better emulator using x86 which gives better performance in my machine (10x faster):

Google Play Intel x86 Atom System Image (system-images;android-24;google_apis_playstore;x86)

I shared the same answer here too.

score 1 · Answer 12 · answered Apr 05 '19 at 12:44

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The only thing that worked for me was opening the emulator first of all. With the emulator opened I run the command: cordova emulate android. "LAUNCH SUCCESS".

answered Apr 05 '19 at 12:44

leonardofmed

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score 0 · Answer 13 · answered Dec 10 '15 at 12:08

0

You can use emulation only in debug mode. Perhaps are you on release mode? Use

console>cordova build --debug

AND THEN

console>cordova emulate android

answered Dec 10 '15 at 12:08

Ademus

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score 0 · Answer 14 · answered Jun 28 '16 at 09:53

In my case the problem was easy. I don't know if you are using emulator or real device connected to the PC. I'm using Samsung phone instead of emulator and it was also stacked on "waiting for emulator...", but in my case the solution was easy - phone was connected to the cable but the cable was corrupted and PC didn't see the phone and was trying to run emulator :]

The simplest solution is always the hardest one...

score 0 · Answer 15 · answered Dec 05 '16 at 00:29

My situation was that a command window would briefly appear and then close. However, I could get the app to run if I manually started the emulator through the AVD manager. Watch where the environment variable ANDROID_HOME is pointing to. I had multiple copies of the sdk installed. I upgraded the sdk and pointed the environment variable to it and that resolved the problem.

shawn nelson · Answer 16 · 2018-02-26T18:33:49.510

After waiting an eternity on "waiting for emulator to start..." on Windows 8 I:

A. I open Android Studio and realized none of the System Images for my Android version were actually not installed because when I originally installed Android Studio I was on a VPN that blocked the download unbeknownst to me. After disconnecting from the VPN and reinstalling Android Studio the System Images installed and I moved on to Step B below.

B. per: this

1) Open SDK Manager (In Android Studio, go to Tools > Android > SDK Manager) and Download Intel x86 Emulator Accelerator (HAXM installer) if you haven't.

2) Now go to your SDK directory C:\users\%USERNAME%\AppData\Local\Android\sdk\extras\intel\Hardware_Accelerated_Execution_Manager\ and run the file named intelhaxm-android.exe.

In case you get an error like "Intel virtualization technology (vt,vt-x) is not enabled". Go to your BIOS settings and enable Hardware Virtualization.

3) Restart Android Studio and then try to start the AVD again.

It might take a minute or 2 to show the emulator window.

score 0 · Answer 17 · answered Mar 25 '19 at 20:04

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For me the problem was the device. I changed the Nexus 5 for Pixel and now works fine.

Tested all the above solutions and didn't worked.

answered Mar 25 '19 at 20:04

Angel Luis

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score 0 · Answer 18 · answered Aug 15 '19 at 04:42

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I had to uninstall the existing app. After that, I could install it again.

answered Aug 15 '19 at 04:42

tokyodrift

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score 0 · Answer 19 · answered Apr 06 '21 at 18:48

I know this topic is old, but I just got this problem and for me the solution was very simple. I had to remove the AVD and add it again. After that I was able to run the cordova command with no problem at all.

So just go to the Android Studio > AVD Manager > Remove the AVD that is not booting up > Add a new AVD > Run the command again

Make sure to have VT-x ON, Gradle Installed, Android SDK from the project installed, HAMX Installed and etc.

CMD stuck on "Waiting for emulator..."

19 Answers19