Why can't I find any Shared Preferences?

If a game has no Shared Preferences to edit, it’s storing its data another way – most often in an SQLite database. No developer is required to use Shared Preferences, so when they’re missing, check the app’s other files instead.

What are Shared Preferences?

Shared Preferences are the most common way for Android apps to save simple data such as numbers, text and dates. That might be usage data (like when you last opened the app), or – if you’re lucky – your highscore, coin count or game currency. Occasionally, poorly written apps even store a username and password there with no encryption at all.

Where else Android apps store data

The second most common option is an SQLite database. While Shared Preferences hold simple standalone values, databases store structured, repeating records. A good example is a chat log: every message is saved as its own row in a database. So yes – Cheat Droid can browse and edit SQLite data too, which is exactly where many games keep the values you’re after.

If you don’t see Shared Preferences, open the app’s SQLite databases in Cheat Droid and look there.

For developers: how to protect your app

Want to defend your app against tools like Cheat Droid? Encrypt the important data you store. You can keep using Shared Preferences, but wrap them in encryption – either with the javax.crypto classes or a ready-made library such as secure-preferences (which, fittingly, cites us as the reason it exists).