Privacy is one of the top priority in modern days. Both iOS and Android have their built-in permission management. If you haven’t used them, you should start them now.
- Android Built-in Permission Management – Google Support
- iOS control access to information – Apple
For example,
- You can restrict a calculator app to access a microphone,
- Or restrict a camera app to access your internet.
However, if you are an advanced Android user, there are some more powerful tools to manage your privacy better. Two popular tools I found for this purpose are XPrivacyLua and App Ops – Permission Manager.
XPrivacy Lua
I have used XPrivacy and XPrivacy Lua for more than 6 years, XPrivacy has been discontinued, recently XPrivacyLua has been archieved as well, in this article, we will focus on XPrivacyLua. Even its source code repo has been archived by the author, users can still use it.
XPrivacy Lua is a powerful tool that requires the XPosed framework (LSPosed). It offers a high degree of control over individual app permissions. The unique feature it provides is it will mock the data for the app if you restrict the app to access it. For example, if you restrict a Map to access location through Android built-in permission management, Map app will complain, it will not work until you grant Location permission, in XPrivacyLua, it is different, the app will still run and it will receive a GPS location at Latitude 0 and Longitude 0.
App Ops – Permission Manager
This is a newer closed source permission management application on Android, from Rikka, the author of Shizuku. It does not require XPosed framework, but it requires users have one of Zygisk-Sui or Shizuku to be able to run the app.
It uses Android AppOps functionality, to manage permission granularly. So each permission it usually has 3 actions,
- Ignore
- Allow
- Deny
Ignore action is similar to the restrict in XPrivacyLua, which will give the app empty data.
Comparing
| Feature | XPrivacy Lua | App Ops |
| Required Framework | XPosed | Sui or Shizuku |
| Required Root | Yes | Yes (or Shizuku ADB Mode) |
| Released year | 2018 (discontinued) | 2019 (continuing) |
| Granular Management | Yes | Yes, even more |
| Pro/Paid Feature | Yes, pro feature make it more user-friendly | Yes, pro feature make it more user-friendly |
| Default/Template | Can set to block by default | No similar rule, template is a paid feature |
| Bulk Select for permissions | No | Yes |
| Functionality Rating | ★★★★ 4.0 | ★★★★★ 5.0 |
| UX Rating | ★★★★ 4.0 | ★★★☆ 3.5 |
| Community Popularity | ★★★★ 4.0 | ★★★ 3.0 |
| Maintenance Level | ★★ 2.0 | ★★★★ 4.0 |
| Overall | ★★★☆ 3.5 | ★★★★ 4.0 |
P.S.
I have only used the free version of both apps, based on the free versions I would like to say that XPrivacy Lua’s default blocking feature is a time saver, I had about 200+ apps on my phone, I configured them one by one on App Ops, it took me about 1 to 2 hours to finish. However, App Ops allows users to batch select permissions for a specific app. Therefore, I gave XPrivacy Lua 4.0 and App Ops 3.5 a UX rating.
Summary
The overall winner is App Ops with ★★★★ 4 stars, but both XPrivacyLua and App Ops offer valuable tools for managing app permissions on rooted Androids.
Choosing Guide:
- If your phone is not rooted with Magisk, use App Ops + Shizuku.
- If you have Magisk + LSPosed working well on your phone, go with XPrivacy Lua.
- If you want to buy an app, try App Ops, the template feature will save you a lot of time.
Personally, I switched from XPrivacy Lua to App Ops because LSPosed stopped working after I upgraded my phone from Lineage OS 20 to 21. In the future, I will try to share more about the experience about switching to and using App Ops permission manager.
Read more:
There is an interesting article about rooted Android apps by Martin Jud (digitec.ch). He has listed 13 of his favourite apps. I have used most of them. If you have a rooted phone and are looking for some rooted app recommendations, give it a try.
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