allowsBackgroundLocationUpdates in CLLocationManager in iOS9 allowsBackgroundLocationUpdates in CLLocationManager in iOS9 ios ios

allowsBackgroundLocationUpdates in CLLocationManager in iOS9


This new property is explained in the WWDC session "What's New in Core Location".

The default value is NO if you link against iOS 9.

If your app uses location in the background (without showing the blue status bar) you have to set allowsBackgroundLocationUpdates to YES in addition to setting the background mode capability in Info.plist. Otherwise location updates are only delivered in foreground. The advantage is that you can now have location managers with background location updates and other location managers with only foreground location updates in the same app. You can also reset the value to NO to change the behavior.

The documentation is pretty clear about it:

By default, this is NO for applications linked against iOS 9.0 or later, regardless of minimum deployment target.

With UIBackgroundModes set to include "location" in Info.plist, you must also set this property to YES at runtime whenever calling -startUpdatingLocation with the intent to continue in the background.

Setting this property to YES when UIBackgroundModes does not include "location" is a fatal error.

Resetting this property to NO is equivalent to omitting "location" from the UIBackgroundModes value. Access to location is still permitted whenever the application is running (ie not suspended), and has sufficient authorization (ie it has WhenInUse authorization and is in use, or it has Always authorization). However, the app will still be subject to the usual task suspension rules.

See -requestWhenInUseAuthorization and -requestAlwaysAuthorization for more details on possible authorization values.


If you're using CoreLocation framework in your app in Xcode7(pre-released),and you may notice that there is a newly added property called allowsBackgroundLocationUpdates in CLLocationManager class.

This new property is explained in the WWDC session "What's New in Core Location". enter image description here

The default value is NO if you link against iOS 9.

If your app uses location in the background (without showing the blue status bar) you have to set allowsBackgroundLocationUpdates to YES in addition to setting the background mode capability in Info.plist. Otherwise location updates are only delivered in foreground. The advantage is that you can now have location managers with background location updates and other location managers with only foreground location updates in the same app. You can also reset the value to NO to change the behavior.

The documentation is pretty clear about it:

By default, this is NO for applications linked against iOS 9.0 or later, regardless of minimum deployment target.

With UIBackgroundModes set to include "location" in Info.plist, you must also set this property to YES at runtime whenever calling -startUpdatingLocation with the intent to continue in the background.

Setting this property to YES when UIBackgroundModes does not include "location" is a fatal error.

Resetting this property to NO is equivalent to omitting "location" from the UIBackgroundModes value. Access to location is still permitted whenever the application is running (ie not suspended), and has sufficient authorization (ie it has WhenInUse authorization and is in use, or it has Always authorization). However, the app will still be subject to the usual task suspension rules.

See -requestWhenInUseAuthorization and -requestAlwaysAuthorization for more details on possible authorization values.

Set Info.plist likeļ¼š enter image description here

The syntax for the Info.plist configuration looks like this:

<key>NSLocationAlwaysUsageDescription</key><string>I want to get your location Information in background</string><key>UIBackgroundModes</key><array>    <string>location</string></array>

Or pull up the Capabilities tab of your app target.

enter image description here
(source: raywenderlich.com)

Use like:

_locationManager = [[CLLocationManager alloc] init];_locationManager.delegate = self;[_locationManager setDesiredAccuracy:kCLLocationAccuracyBest];if ([[[UIDevice currentDevice] systemVersion] floatValue] >= 8) {    [_locationManager requestAlwaysAuthorization];}if ([[[UIDevice currentDevice] systemVersion] floatValue] >= 9) {    _locationManager.allowsBackgroundLocationUpdates = YES;}[_locationManager startUpdatingLocation];

I write a Demo Here (Demo2)


{NSArray* backgroundModes  = [NSBundle MainBundle].infoDictionary[@"UIBackgroundModes"];     if(backgroundModes && [backgroundModes containsObject:@"location"]) {         if([manager respondsToSelector:@selector(setAllowsBackgroundLocationUpdates:)]) {             // We now have iOS9 and the right capabilities to set this:             [manager setAllowsBackgroundLocationUpdates:YES];         }     }}