Oculus SDK incompatibility with PlayStore / Android smartphones

Unity Engine
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The problem: losing ridiculously amount of compatible android devices after using or upgrading Oculus SDK on Unity - from 4000+ to around 27.

It took me a while to solve it, so I’m just posting it for other cross-platform developers out there (yeah, VR and smartphones are not very common, but that’s what we do ).

So the solution is to open the AndroidManifest.xml and add:

<uses-feature android:name="android.hardware.vr.headtracking" tools:node="remove" />

For Android smartphone builds, and remove it on Oculus/VR builds.
It would remove the autogenerated requirement for headtracking feature that almost no phone supports.

I’ve also added:

<uses-feature android:glEsVersion="0x00030000" tools:node="remove" />

Just in case, although it’s not recommended if the first one works for you.

So in general, if you have many SDKs that messes with the manifest and have a similar problem, know that you can override and remove AndroidManifest elements manually with tools:node=“remove”.

So related google searches might include:
Google PlayStore just support few devices
Devices compatibility lose
Many devices cannot install the apk from Google Play

Hope it would help anyone out there in the wild

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You also need to append xmlns:tools=“http://schemas.android.com/tools” to your manifest xmlns:android=“http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android”

documented here:

for a reason line are not removed from the “Temp\StagingArea\UnityManifest.xml” when I use the remove tag.

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