Hardening guide — so protection doesn't silently die
For parents. You do this once, after setting up TinkerProof. Last updated: August 1, 2026
0. Who this is for, when to do it, and how long it takes
Who it's for: the mom or dad who just finished getting the tablet ready for
their child. You don't need to know anything about technology or plug the tablet into a
computer.
When: just once, after you finish setting up TinkerProof
(your PIN, your child's apps, the home screen, and protection). And again
after every major system update, which sometimes undoes these
permissions.
How long it takes: 3 to 10 minutes, depending on the brand.
Why you need to do this. Many tablets and phones ship with a factory "battery
saver" that closes apps nobody is actively using, so the battery lasts longer. TinkerProof
needs to stay awake the whole time: it's the app that brings your child back to their home screen
when they wander somewhere they shouldn't. If the device closes it, protection turns off
on its own, silently. The steps in this guide tell the device: "hands off this
app".
There are three hardening steps plus one final safety step
(turning off USB debugging, only if you used it). These steps cannot be done from inside
the app: Android doesn't allow it. That's why you have to do them yourself, by hand,
once.
🔑 Before you start: did you save your rescue code?
When you created your PIN, TinkerProof showed you a 12-digit code once. That
code is the only way back in if you forget your PIN.
Why it matters more than it looks. With protection on, the device won't let
you into Settings, or the app stores, or uninstall TinkerProof: all of that opens with your
PIN. If you forget it and don't have the code written down, the only way out is reinstalling
the app — and that loses the whole setup: your child's apps, the volume cap, the schedule.
If you didn't save it, do it now: open the gear on the main screen with
your PIN, find "Rescue code" and tap
"Generate a new code". On the card that appears, tap
"Send it to me": your email opens with the code already written; put your own address in "To" and tap send.
Nothing to copy by hand.
Where it has to end up: somewhere you can open from ANOTHER
device — your inbox, the notes on your phone, paper if you prefer. The reason is
simple: if you forget the PIN, you won't be able to open anything on this tablet,
not even to read the code. And keep it away from your child: whoever has the code can change
the PIN.
If you ever use it, the app makes you choose a new PIN and hands you a new
code right away. The old paper stops working: write down the new one.
1. ⚠️ The order rule (read this before touching anything)
PAUSE protection first. Do the hardening with protection paused.
Turn it back on at the end.
Why. The menu where "autostart" lives is the brand's security
center (on Xiaomi it's called "Security", on Oppo "Security Center", on
Vivo "i Manager", on Samsung "Battery and device care"). With protection
on, TinkerProof bounces you out of exactly those menus — which is what it should
do; that's where a child could take the whole thing apart. But while you are the
one doing the setup, it gets in your way.
How to pause it (10 seconds):
On your child's home screen, tap the gear (at the top).
Enter your PIN.
Turn off the "Protection active" switch.
Shortcut: on that same screen, the "Open system settings" button pauses
protection and takes you straight to Settings, in one tap.
With protection paused, the tablet goes back to being a normal tablet: the
usual home screen comes up (Samsung's, Xiaomi's, whichever it came with), with all its apps.
That's where you do the hardening in peace.
How to turn it back on at the end (1 tap): open TinkerProof
from the device's apps. Just opening it brings kid mode back. It won't ask for your PIN or send
you back to Settings (the PIN protects turning protection off, not on).
😌 If you forgot and already turned protection back on, don't worry
You're not locked out. Two things save you:
You can pause again whenever you want with your PIN (gear → PIN →
"Protection active" OFF), finish what's left, and reactivate.
And when you tap the "Protection active" switch and the app sends you to
the Accessibility settings, it gives you a grace period (about 2 minutes) so
you can finish that errand without being bounced. Careful: that grace period
is for that trip only, not for the hardening you're about to do by hand —
walking to the brand's security center on your own gets no grace period.
That's why it's better to harden while paused.
So if you were halfway through the hardening and protection came back on: pause and keep going.
Nothing breaks.
2. The steps that apply to every brand
Step 1 — "Allow restricted settings" · ONLY if the switch shows up GRAYED OUT (Android 13 or newer)
⚠️ This does NOT happen to everyone. Most people will never see it.
It only shows up when the app was installed outside Google Play (an APK file
passed along by hand). Installing from Play, it doesn't appear. And on the only
tablet where this was actually tested (a Samsung Galaxy Tab A8, Android 14), it didn't
appear either — neither with the APK by hand, nor installing from Google
Play, which was tested on 2026-08-24: there the switch turned on in one go, with no
extra screen in between.
How you'll know: when you try to turn on "TinkerProof Protection" in Settings →
Accessibility, the switch looks grayed out and won't respond; the device says
something like "Restricted setting".
If it happens to you, the app itself shows you the screen with the steps. They are:
Tap "Open app info".
At the top right, tap the three-dot menu (⋮).
Choose "Allow restricted settings" and confirm.
Go back to Accessibility and turn on "TinkerProof Protection".
If the switch was not grayed out, this step doesn't apply: tap "Retry in
Accessibility".
UNCERTAIN (we're not claiming this): we don't know for sure
whether you have to redo this step when the app updates. Most likely
not: the block applies at the moment the service is turned on, and it
normally doesn't turn off one that was already running. If someday you see the "Protection off"
screen right after an update, now you know where to look.
Step 2 — Battery: set TinkerProof to "Unrestricted" (all brands)
This is the step that helps the most, and it exists on almost every modern device.
The names vary a bit by brand and version. Look for a Battery option inside
TinkerProof's app info page and pick the least battery-saving choice. The words
you'll usually see:
✅ What you want: "Unrestricted", "Not optimized", "Allow background
activity", "Don't optimize".
❌ What you do not want: "Optimized", "Restricted", "Battery saver",
"Put to sleep".
Step 3 — Autostart: turned on
This doesn't exist on every brand. It's specific to Xiaomi, Oppo, OnePlus, Realme,
Vivo, Honor, Tecno, Infinix, itel, and Asus. It lives inside the brand's security app
(not in the regular Settings). On Samsung, Motorola, Pixel, and Nokia it doesn't appear in
the documentation we use; if you can't find it on your device, that's fine: the battery
step is enough.
⚠️ Huawei is not supported (see section 5). On Honor
this step is worth doing, though on that brand we still haven't tested it on a real
device: see its card in section 4.
👉 Exactly where to tap, brand by brand: section 4.
Step 4 — 🚨 If you touched "Developer options": turn USB DEBUGGING off when you finish
This is the most important step in the whole guide, and the easiest one to forget.
Some advanced tips (for example, turning off "MIUI optimization" on Xiaomi) ask you to enter a
hidden menu called Developer options. That menu includes a switch called
"USB debugging".
With USB debugging on, anyone who plugs the tablet into a computer can turn off
protection or remove TinkerProof in a minute. You'd be opening a bigger hole than the one
you came to plug.
When you're done: Settings → Developer options → turn off "USB debugging".
(On some devices that menu is inside "System"; on Samsung it's at the
very bottom of the Settings list.) If you can, turn off the whole menu (the switch at the
very top, "Developer options").
If you never went in there, there's nothing for you to do: it ships turned off from the factory.
3. While you harden, you won't see any alarms — and that's fine
Important, so you don't get confused. TinkerProof warns you when protection
goes down, in two ways:
Warning
What it looks like
When it appears
The lock screen warning
A padlock 🔒 covering your child's home screen: "Protection off", with the
buttons "Reactivate protection" and "Use without protection"
When returning to your child's home screen
The notification
"Protection off. Tap to reactivate it."
Every so often (roughly every 15 minutes), even if your child is inside an app
There's a second version of both, for when the problem is different: "TinkerProof is no
longer the home screen" (another app took over the Home button).
🔇 While you're doing the hardening, with protection paused, you will
NOT see either of them. That's normal, and it does not mean everything is ready. The lock
screen warning and the notification only work with protection on. If you finish
the hardening and stare at the screen waiting for a signal, it's not coming: the last step
is turning protection on (opening TinkerProof), and only then does the warning system
start keeping watch.
How to check it worked (the honest test):
Turn protection on (open TinkerProof).
Restart the device. Wait for it to boot up.
Your child's home screen should appear with their apps, without the padlock 🔒.
The long test (the one that really counts): leave the tablet with the screen off for
a whole night. In the morning, press the power button. If your child's home screen
appears and not the padlock, the hardening held.
Two honest limits, so you don't get caught by surprise:
The notification warning doesn't always arrive on time: on some devices the
system delays it or cuts it off. It also needs you to have granted TinkerProof notification
permission.
No Android app can turn its own accessibility service back on. If the
device turns it off, TinkerProof can warn you and guide you, but the final tap has to come
from you.
4. Brand-by-brand cards
How to read each card's status: VERIFIED = tested on a real device (today, only the Samsung family: a Galaxy Tab
A8 tablet). INFERRED = taken from serious documentation (mostly dontkillmyapp.com), but
not tested on that device. DOCUMENTED BY THE SOURCE = a serious source says so, but nobody on the
project has seen it happen on a device. That is not the same as VERIFIED. UNKNOWN = no reliable data. ⚠️ PATH NOT YET CONFIRMED ON A REAL DEVICE = we know what to look for,
but the exact menu path isn't documented and we'd rather not make it up.
📱 Samsung (One UI) — Galaxy Tab, Galaxy S/A
Status: the app's rules (bouncing out of Settings, capping the
music/video volume, bouncing out of the device's own home screen) are VERIFIED on a real device (Galaxy Tab
A8 / Android 14). The hardening path below is INFERRED, and whether the app survives hours with
the screen off has NOT been tested yet.
Where to tap: Settings → Apps → TinkerProof → Battery.
What to turn on: the "Unrestricted" option.
Also (recommended): under "Battery and device
care" there's a list called "Never sleeping apps" — add
TinkerProof there. ⚠️ PATH NOT YET CONFIRMED ON A REAL DEVICE: the exact
path to that list changes between One UI versions. Look inside "Battery and device care"
→ "Battery" → the background usage limits.
Autostart:doesn't exist on Samsung. Don't go looking for it.
What NOT to touch: don't put TinkerProof in "Put unused apps to
sleep" or in the "Deep sleep" list. That's the
opposite of what you want. ⚠️ PATH NOT YET CONFIRMED ON A REAL DEVICE: the
exact names change between One UI versions.
How to check it stuck: restart the tablet. It should open to your child's
home screen without the padlock 🔒.
Samsung-specific warning: a system update
can put restrictions back on its own. After every major update,
go over this step again.
📱 Xiaomi / Redmi / POCO (MIUI, HyperOS)
Status: INFERRED (path from documentation, no device). ⚠️ It's
one of the brands where this hardening is needed most.
Where to tap: Settings → Apps → Permissions →
Autostart.
Also (the lock in Recents): open the recent apps screen,
press and hold the TinkerProof card, and tap the lock. That way the
"clear all" button won't close it.
Optional, only if you know what you're doing: turning off "MIUI
optimization" inside Developer options. 🚨 If you go in there, read
Step 4 in section 2 and leave USB debugging off on your
way out.
What NOT to touch: after setting all this up, TinkerProof will
block the "Security" menu whenever protection is on. That's on
purpose. That's why this hardening is done while paused.
How to check it stuck: restart the device and wait a minute without touching it.
Your child's home screen should stay up, without the padlock 🔒.
Xiaomi-specific warning (DOCUMENTED BY THE SOURCE): after a
system update (HyperOS), accessibility can end up turned
off. It's this brand's #1 risk: every time the device updates, open
TinkerProof and make sure the padlock 🔒 doesn't appear.
Status: INFERRED. ⚠️ The most troublesome brand among those
TinkerProof supports.
Where to tap: the brand's app called "Security
Center" / "Security" / "Phone Manager", in its
autostart section (Startup manager / Auto
Start-up). ⚠️ PATH NOT YET CONFIRMED ON A REAL DEVICE: the exact menu
path isn't documented and changes between ColorOS versions. What to look for: a list of
apps with an "autostart" switch, and there turn TinkerProof on.
What to turn on: autostart ON for TinkerProof. And on the
app's info page: Battery → "Run in background" and
"Unrestricted".
What NOT to touch: the "clean up memory" / "speed up" button.
On these devices, cleaning memory can hand the home screen back to the factory
launcher — that is, push TinkerProof out of its spot. Teach your child that that
button is off-limits (and if a message appears saying TinkerProof is no longer the home
screen, now you know what happened).
How to check it stuck: turn protection on, turn the screen off,
wait a few minutes, and turn it back on. Your child's home screen should appear,
without the padlock 🔒.
⚠️ A big, honest warning (DOCUMENTED BY THE SOURCE, for Oppo):
the community's own documentation says that on Oppo accessibility services turn off every
time the screen turns off, and you have to turn them back on by hand.
There is no fix on the app's side. If that happens on your device, TinkerProof
will warn you (padlock 🔒 + notification), but the hardening may not be enough. Whether
the same failure happens on OnePlus and Realme is UNCERTAIN — the source only claims it
for Oppo.
📱 Vivo / iQOO (Funtouch OS, OriginOS)
Status: INFERRED (path quoted verbatim from documentation). ⚠️ High
uncertainty: the source itself says Vivo's restrictions are "not fully
mapped".
Where to tap (path exactly as the source publishes it — if your device is set to
another language, look for the matching words): Settings > More settings > Applications > Autostart
On old Funtouch OS (2.6 or earlier): i Manager > App manager > Autostart
manager.
What to turn on:
Autostart for TinkerProof: ON.
"High background power consumption":
ON for TinkerProof.
On Android 13 or newer: "Unrestricted battery usage".
Watch out for the home screen (INFERRED): on several Vivo devices, for
another app to become the home screen you need to be signed in with a Vivo
account and turn off the option that locks the system home screen
(Tap home button to lock system home). Otherwise, the device goes back to its own
launcher by itself. ⚠️ PATH NOT YET CONFIRMED ON A REAL DEVICE.
What NOT to touch: "i Manager" stays blocked while protection is
on. That's on purpose.
How to check it stuck: restart, then turn the screen off for a while.
Your child's home screen should come back without the padlock 🔒 and with TinkerProof
still as the home screen.
📱 Motorola / Lenovo
Status: INFERRED (medium confidence).
Where to tap: Settings → Apps → TinkerProof → Battery →
"Unrestricted". (Motorola is nearly stock Android, so the common path
from section 2 applies well.)
What to turn on: "Unrestricted". Autostart doesn't
appear in the documentation we use for these brands; if you can't find it on your device,
that's fine: the battery step is enough. (Lenovo/ZUI is a different skin from Motorola's
and is less documented.)
Motorola-specific warning (DOCUMENTED BY THE SOURCE): Motorola ships a
component called "Battery Care" that closes background apps
even with its switch turned off. Setting TinkerProof to "Unrestricted" is
the practical cure; some people uninstall it with a computer, but we don't
recommend that (and if you do it, read Step 4: leave USB debugging
off).
Lenovo-specific warning: on Lenovo tablets, swiping the TinkerProof
card away on the recent apps screen closes it. Use the
lock on the card.
Also, on Lenovo tablets:"Kids Space" comes preinstalled,
and it also wants to be the home screen. If the device asks which one to
use, choose TinkerProof (and "Always"). If Kids Space keeps the Home button,
TinkerProof will show you the "TinkerProof is no longer the home screen" message with
the button to fix it.
How to check it stuck: restart; then open Recents and tap "clear
all": your child's home screen should still be alive, without the padlock 🔒.
📱 Transsion — Tecno / Infinix / itel
Status: INFERRED, with UNKNOWN parts. Very common budget
devices in Latin America.
Where to tap: the brand's app called "PhoneMaster" (or
"Power Center" / "Phone Manager" — the name changes by
model), in its autostart and battery sections.
⚠️ PATH NOT YET CONFIRMED ON A REAL DEVICE: the exact menu path is
not documented. What to look for: inside that app, a list of applications with
"autostart" / "auto-start" / "run in background" switches, and turn
TinkerProof on. Also, if it exists, take TinkerProof off the list of
"optimized apps" or "apps that get closed".
What to turn on: autostart ON and battery unrestricted
for TinkerProof.
What NOT to touch:PhoneMaster can uninstall apps by the
dozen with a couple of taps. That's why TinkerProof blocks it while protection
is on. Set it up while paused and don't go back in unless you
need to.
How to check it stuck: restart and let the device sit still for a few minutes
with the screen off. Your child's home screen should come back without the padlock 🔒.
An honest warning: these devices have a reputation for closing apps that
should stay open. It's one of the brands where the full-overnight test matters
most before calling the device ready.
📱 Asus (ZenUI)
Status: INFERRED. A brand with an aggressive battery saver (4 of
5 on the community's scale).
Where to tap: the brand's app "Mobile Manager", in its
autostart section (Auto-start Manager) and in
"Power Master" (battery). ⚠️ PATH NOT YET CONFIRMED ON A REAL DEVICE:
the names of the two tools are documented, but the exact menu path
is not. Look for "Mobile Manager" in the app drawer and, inside it, the
autostart list.
What to turn on: autostart ON for TinkerProof; and in
"Power Master", take it out of power saving or set it as not optimized.
How to check it stuck: restart and run the overnight test.
📱 Sony / LG / TCL-Alcatel / ZTE (generic card)
Status: mixed. Sony INFERRED · LG INFERRED (low risk) · TCL
and ZTE UNKNOWN.
These brands don't have a security center as invasive as the Chinese ones, but they aren't
documented in detail either.
What applies to all of them: Settings → Apps → TinkerProof →
Battery → "Unrestricted" (or the least battery-saving
equivalent your device offers).
Sony (Xperia): turn off STAMINA mode while your child is
using the device, or exclude TinkerProof from power saving. The "Prefer battery
life" option is the most aggressive: avoid it. ⚠️ PATH NOT YET CONFIRMED ON
A REAL DEVICE for the exact path.
LG:not scored in the community source. We assume
low risk, but it's not confirmed — run the overnight test anyway.
TCL / Alcatel / ZTE:there is no reliable data on how they
behave. Assume medium risk: do the battery step, check whether the device ships some
"phone manager" app with autostart, and run the full-overnight
test no matter what before calling it ready.
How to check it stuck (all of them): restart + overnight test.
Status: the cleanest family. The app's rules are
VERIFIED on the emulator (Android 7, 14, and 16), which is Pixel-style stock Android. Careful: on a Nokia
nothing has ever been run, neither on an emulator nor on a device. The hardening, INFERRED — but it's barely
needed.
They don't need battery or autostart hardening. These devices don't
ship a "battery saver" that kills apps on its own, and they turn the service back on by
themselves after a restart. Nokia/HMD has the best possible score on the community's scale
(0 = kills nothing).
BUT careful, Step 1 CAN still apply to them — the one in section 2 ("Allow
restricted settings") — because it depends on how the app was
installed, not on the brand: if you installed it from an APK file and not from Google Play,
the switch can show up grayed out. From Play, it won't.
If you want, just in case: setting TinkerProof to Battery → "Unrestricted"
doesn't hurt or break anything. It's optional.
How to check it stuck: restart; it should open to your child's home screen
without the padlock 🔒.
Rare case (Android 16): if someone turned on the device's "Advanced
Protection" mode, it may not let you turn on TinkerProof's protection. It's an
option that has to be turned on deliberately. ⚠️ PATH NOT YET CONFIRMED ON A REAL DEVICE.
What to look for: inside Settings, the
security section, an option called "Advanced Protection" — if
it's on, turn it off. Careful: turning it off lowers one of the
device's defenses, so do it only if it's genuinely blocking
TinkerProof's activation.
📱 Honor (MagicOS) — unverified
Status: UNKNOWN. We have not tested TinkerProof on any
Honor device. We don't block it and we don't promise it: if you install it, keep this card
in hand and tell us how it went.
Where to tap: the brand's app ("Optimizer" /
"Phone Manager"), under autostart
(Auto-launch) and in the battery section. Steps
1, 2, and 3 from section 2 apply, same as on any other brand.
Why we keep it separate from Huawei: Honor and Huawei were the same company
until late 2020. Since the sale they are different brands, with different systems, and Honor
devices ship with Google Play again. The PowerGenie app killer that breaks
Huawei is documented for Huawei: it's reasonable to expect Honor might ship
it too, but nobody has confirmed it.
What to watch for: if TinkerProof closes by itself every so often and the
padlock 🔒 appears, Honor probably ships something similar to PowerGenie. In that case, write
to us at contact@tinkerproof.com and we'll send
you the specific instructions, which exist but which we don't publish.
⚠️ Huawei is out of support (it is different from Honor). The
reason is in section 5.
5. Devices that are left out
Today TinkerProof does not support these devices:
Device
What happens
Any way around it?
Amazon Fire tablets (Fire OS 7 and 8)
Fire OS has no menu for choosing the home screen. TinkerProof
installs, but it can't be your child's home screen, which is what
everything depends on.
Only with a computer and technical tools (you have to turn on developer
options and USB debugging — 🚨 if you ever do it,
turn debugging off when you finish, see Step 4 in section 2) — and it
breaks with every Fire OS update. Not a solution for a family.
Amazon has its own "Amazon Kids".
Huawei (all of them: EMUI, HarmonyOS 2 through 4)
They ship from the factory with an app killer called PowerGenie, which closes
everything that isn't on a closed, factory-set whitelist — and apps
cannot be added to that list. With it running, TinkerProof dies on its own
and protection goes down with it. The hardening in this guide is not enough.
Instructions to disable PowerGenie exist, but we don't publish them and
we haven't tested them on a real device: we don't want you to buy
something that depends on that. If you already own a Huawei and want to try anyway, write
to us at contact@tinkerproof.com.
Honor is not in this row — it's been a different brand since 2020: see section 4.
Huawei with HarmonyOS NEXT (versions 5 and 6)
That system is no longer Android: it doesn't run Android apps. The app
won't install.
No.
Something doesn't match your device?
Every manufacturer's menus change with updates. If a step in this guide isn't called that on
your device, write to us at
contact@tinkerproof.com and we'll fix it.