XML With SimpleXML Library - Performance on Android

Well, there are many things you can do to improve this. Here they are.

1) On Android you should be using at least version 2.5.2, but ideally 2.5.3 as it uses KXML which is much faster and more memory efficient on Android.

2) Simple will dynamically build your object graph, this means that it will need to load classes that have not already been loaded, and build a schema for each class based on its annotations using reflection. So first use will always be by far the most expensive. Repeated use of the same persister instance will be many times faster. So try to avoid multiple persister instances, just use one if possible.

3) Try measure the time taken to read the file directly, without using the Simple XML library. How long does it take? If it takes forever then you know the performance hit here is due to the file system. Try use a BufferedInputStream to improve performance.

4) If you still notice any issues, raise it on the mailing list.

EDIT: Android has some issues with annotation processing https://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=7811, Simple 2.6.6 fixes has implemented work arounds for these issues. Performance increases of 10 times can be observed.