Dual Apps on Nokia Android Smartphones

Muser

Disclaimer: Do this at your own risk! This worked on my US variant Nokia 6 2017 running Android 9 but I don't know if it will work on all Nokia devices or variants. Before proceeding remember to back up any important data.

Stock Android/Android One doesn't support dual or clone apps out of the box but it does support a feature called "Work Profile" which, once configured, essentially does the same thing. It's intended to work with Enterprise software but many third party apps can also enable it on a device. I personally use an app called Shelter because it's free and open source.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.typeblog.shelter

(If you use a different app please share it below)

Once you install and configure the app, your App Drawer will be split up into two categories, "Personal" and "Work". The Work category will come with some pre-installed Google apps, you can remove these if you like. To clone a Personal app into Work,

- Open Shelter

- From the "Main" category, tap the app you want to clone

- In the popup menu select "Clone to Shelter (Work Profile)"

- An Android installer screen will appear to guide you through the process

You can also use Google Play straight from the Work profile to install apps.

By default apps in your Work space will not have access to data from your Personal space and vice versa. You can enable partial access from the File Picker by,

- Opening Shelter

- Selecting the 3 dots in the top right hand corner of the app

- Tapping on Settings

- Enabling "File Shuttle" (read the description first though)

Work apps will have access to shared Android data regardless (contacts, phone details, etc).

If you want to remove your Work Profile do not uninstall the app until you've followed the uninstall steps outlined in the FAQ on Shelter's Google Play listing. As this functionality relies on a third party app, I wouldn't recommend storing any important data on the Work space unless it's also backed up somewhere else (this is also true for any data on your smartphone).

If this seems too complicated or risky another option that you can try is setting up a new Android user.

https://support.google.com/nexus/answer/2865483

Ideally HMD (cc @HMD_Laura and @juho ) can create their own version of this app on Google Play to ensure continued support on their devices, similar to App Folder and other Nokia workarounds in the Windows Phone days. If HMD is serious about the benefits of stock Android there's no better way to highlight its advantages over the competition than supporting native Android features like this.

Noobsaibot21

I gave it a go (along with another App called Island) and while it worked great for having a separate Outlook, Chrome etc... for work mails and bookmarks, I was unable to get it set up in such a way where I could dictate that calls, Contacts and messages relevant to Sim 2 (aka the work number) ONLY show on the cloned variants. I was getting a message stating only the admin could do so (I enabled device admin for the app but same message) - Is there any way around that?

It's odd that we have had dual sim phones for several years now and yet this type of use case (what should be a very obvious and almost trivial feature) doesn't seem to be standard. In this covid age where people have to adapt to WFH, I'd have thought this would be a no brainer. None of the other major phone manufacturers seem to offer this (aside from Samsung to a degree) and HMD/Nokia (or any App developer) could make A LOT of money from businesses and end users if they were to offer that.

Personally, I don't even really care about the browser and mailbox client clone (I can always just save bookmarks on a different browser and set up the Outlook account separately on the one I have installed if I have to). All I want is:

• Two dialers with separate call logs (one for each sim)
• Two Contacts lists (again separate, again one for each sim)
• Two Messages inboxes for SMS (again, separate and one per sim)
• The means to turn off calls/texts etc.... to and from the work sim after hours

Can this be done in some way on my beloved Nokia 5.3?

Muhamadgani

I want dual app