The Play Console is flagging my app with the DEX code optimization warning (requiring R8 shrinkage and obfuscation on release builds).

Here's the catch-22: Whenever I enable R8 for a release build, the app runs completely fine locally across my physical and virtual test devices. However, as soon as I submit it to Play Console (even on Closed Testing), the automated review bot rejects it for "Unresponsive app / Broken Functionality."

  • Telemetry Gap - Neither Android Vital nor Firebase Crashlytics records any crash or ANR during the review window.
  • Support Wall - Support refuses to provide stack traces, logcat dumps, or even clarify which version code failed.

Disabling R8 entirely and resubmitting allowed the app to pass review, proving R8 is triggering something specific on Google's automated test harness.

My app is an edge AI tool with a large local model footprint (2 GB). I suspect the R8 build might be breaking reflection in a background dependency or causing a thread lock or startup delay on their test labs that triggers an ANR.

Questions for the community:

  • Has anyone successfully debugged an R8-only rejection when Play Console refuses to provide logs?
  • How can I simulate the exact environment Google's automated review bots use during pre-launch?
submitted by /u/Pitiful-Squirrel4562
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