Any recommendations? For doing testing and dev rather than games (not Android app dev though, so something other than Android Studio). Preferably free.

Assume it’s for testing web stuff if not apps? Just use a real phone? Also depends what browser but for android majority will be chrome.

No, testing interfacing to 3rd party apps. Required screen size is too large for my phone (or most phones) – there is dedicated hardware available, but it’s ££££

Qemue emulator with a android image?

Apparently one called limbo

Can you not start off by pressing F12 when in Chrome (assuming developing on a Windows machine) and using one of the built in emulators to begin with?

You can also toggle Device Mode by pressing Command+Shift+M (Mac) or Ctrl+Shift+M (Windows, Linux). To use this shortcut your mouse needs to be focused on your DevTools window.

As I said, it’s not web stuff, I need to be able to install apks

i’ve used Bluestacks in the past

Genymotion is good.

Surprisingly, Microsoft’s Android emulator is really rather good, and free.

https://www.visualstudio.com/vs/msft-android-emulator/

Thanks for the help – Genymotion is what was suggested to use by the vendor of the apps I’m working with, but the apps weren’t installing properly hence the request for suggestions. I also tried MS Android emulator (and might go back to that as the performance seems better). However I did then try installing on my phone* and discovered there was extra installation authorisation which hadn’t been obvious on the emulator (where I’m running an oldish version of Android). So now I’ve gone back to Genymotion and it seems to be working, at least on the slightly less archaic version of Android (though I really want to test with an even older version as that’s what the customer is using).

* it’s very strange stuff to have on my phone!

I’ve tried most and have found Nox is the best emulator, although I use it to feed my Clash of Clans addiction rather than anything useful.

I use Memu, which seems to be the only one I’ve tried (bluestacks, andy, genymotion and a few others) that isn’t truly awful.

Another vote for NOX. Use it almost daily for prototyping. Easy to setup, can use multiple instances if required and simple .APK installing.

Thanks again – tried Nox last night and it was just crashing, but then I was getting BSODs last night and now I’ve installed the latest W10 update it all seems much better – tried reinstalling and it works. Will see how it compares – also downloaded memu but haven’t tried it yet. Though I suspect some of these mainly designed for gaming won’t give me the option of running older OS versions.

edit: bah – the whole thing’s a pain, now Genymotion won’t connect to Virtualbox

edit, edit: hmm Nox does seem way faster than Genymotion