Best practices for LiveKit session management in React Native apps

Client SDKs
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1

This question originally came up in our Slack community and the thread has been consolidated here for long-term reference.

We’ve integrated LiveKit into our React Native app (around 1M monthly users) for voice AI assistance.

When a user closes the voice screen and navigates elsewhere:

  • Should I keep the session running (muting the mic in background) or end it?
  • Keeping LiveKit active in the background triggers ANR issues on Google Play
  • Starting a new session each time causes a 2-3 second delay before the first response

What’s the recommended approach for session management?

2

To keep LiveKit running in the background on Android, you need to use a Foreground Service. See the documentation:

Important considerations:

  • Foreground Services require additional Play Store submission steps
  • FGS can confuse users if they don’t expect your app to run in the background

Recommendation:

  • If users see your app like a telephone call (long-running conversations), FGS makes sense
  • Otherwise, start a new session each time and accept the startup delay

The 2-3 second delay is mainly due to model warmup and connection establishment.