MAUI app exiting without crashing after inactivity

Question

MAUI app exiting without crashing after inactivity

Jai Holloway 110

Hi there

I have a .NET 10 MAUI app and it is exiting on refresh, or any activity, after being in "sleep" mode for a while. The shortest time I have tried is 4 hours, but I believe 2 hours will have it exit too. I have tried leaving the simulator running to see what happens, but the simulator exits without crashing too. How do I prevent a stale app from going stale and exiting?

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2 answers

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Answer 1

Nancy Vo (WICLOUD CORPORATION) 5,700 Microsoft External Staff Moderator

Hello @Jai Holloway ,

Thanks for your question.

This is most likely the OS silently killing your app to free memory.

I recommend some following workarounds:

Save and restore state

protected override void OnSleep()
{
    Preferences.Set("last_page", "YourPageName");
}

protected override void OnResume()
{
    var lastPage = Preferences.Get("last_page", "MainPage");
}

protected override void OnStart()
{
    var hadSession = Preferences.Get("last_page", null);
    if (hadSession != null)
    {
        // restore session
    }
}

If your app uses authentication, please refresh token on resume.

protected override async void OnResume()
{
    var tokenExpiry = Preferences.Get("token_expiry", DateTime.MinValue.ToString());
    var expiry = DateTime.Parse(tokenExpiry);

    if (DateTime.UtcNow >= expiry)
    {
        await RefreshTokenAsync();
    }
}

Simulator is not reliable for inactivity testing. It's better to test on a real device.

4.If your app needs to stay alive in the background (iOS only), declare background modes in Info.plist.

<key>UIBackgroundModes</key>
<array>
    <string>fetch</string>
    <string>remote-notification</string>
</array>

I hope this addresses your question. If this response was helpful, please consider following the guidance to provide feedback.

Jai Holloway 110 Reputation points

2026-05-25T07:01:15.0433333+00:00

How do I restore session and where do I put this code? Also, you do a simple get, does that refresh the app?
Nancy Vo (WICLOUD CORPORATION) 5,700 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff Moderator

2026-05-25T08:23:59.6166667+00:00
Hi @Jai Holloway ,

All of this goes inside App.xaml.cs.

Preferences.Get only reads the saved value — it does not refresh the app by itself. You still need to manually navigate back to the last page and reload your data. You can refer to following code example:

protected override void OnSleep() { Preferences.Set("last_page", "YourPageName"); } protected override void OnResume() { RestoreSession(); } protected override void OnStart() { RestoreSession(); } private async void RestoreSession() { var lastPage = Preferences.Get("last_page", null); if (lastPage != null) { await Shell.Current.GoToAsync($"//{lastPage}"); await LoadDataAsync(); } else { await Shell.Current.GoToAsync("//MainPage"); } }

OnResume() is called when the app comes back from background, and OnStart() is called when the app was fully killed by the OS and reopened. Both should restore the session, so we reuse the same RestoreSession() method.
Nancy Vo (WICLOUD CORPORATION) 5,700 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff Moderator

2026-05-26T03:02:28.06+00:00

Hi @Jai Holloway ,
If you're still interested or have any questions, feel free to reach out whenever it works best for you.
Jai Holloway 110 Reputation points

2026-05-26T06:07:57.6766667+00:00

Your code for gotoasync did not work. It says it can't resolve the route to MainPage
Jai Holloway 110 Reputation points

2026-05-26T06:25:03.2566667+00:00

I figured out how to get it to GoToAsync. I had to register a route first. But I had trouble with that, I have two mainpage files and it was navigating to the wrong, but a simple fix was to specify the namespace and the mainpage
Nancy Vo (WICLOUD CORPORATION) 5,700 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff Moderator

2026-05-26T07:28:52.73+00:00

Glad to hear it works. If my answer was helpful - kindly follow the instructions here so others with the same problem can benefit as well.
Jai Holloway 110 Reputation points

2026-05-26T10:39:23.7233333+00:00

I get a back arrow, even though I am navigating to the main page. IS there a way to prevent the back arrow?

Nancy Vo (WICLOUD CORPORATION) 5,700 Microsoft External Staff Moderator

I recommend removing the back arrow by setting BackButtonBehavior on the page. You can do it in XAML or code-behind.

<ContentPage ...>
    <Shell.BackButtonBehavior>
        <BackButtonBehavior IsVisible="False" IsEnabled="False" />
    </Shell.BackButtonBehavior>
</ContentPage>

Shell.SetBackButtonBehavior(this, new BackButtonBehavior
{
    IsVisible = false,
    IsEnabled = false
});

Jai Holloway 110 Reputation points

2026-05-26T10:58:37.2766667+00:00

Your solution doesn't work. It does reactivate the app, but the navigation is broken. It doesn't know where back is. I had to remove your solution
Nancy Vo (WICLOUD CORPORATION) 5,700 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff Moderator

2026-05-27T04:32:00.3833333+00:00
Sorry to hear that. To help you better, could you please share:

Your AppShell.xaml structure

How your routes are registered (if any)

This will help understand your navigation setup and provide the correct fix.
Jai Holloway 110 Reputation points

2026-05-27T06:50:19.4166667+00:00

I removed the code, it didn't work and broke when I wasn't navigating to MainPage

Nancy Vo (WICLOUD CORPORATION) 5,700 Microsoft External Staff Moderator

Hi @Jai Holloway ,

I'm sorry to hear that the solution didn't work as expected I appreciate your patience.

I recommend a alternative by using this in App.xaml.cs:


public partial class App : Application

{

    public App()

    {

        InitializeComponent();

    }

    protected override Window CreateWindow(IActivationState? activationState)

    {

        var window = base.CreateWindow(activationState);

        window.Stopped += OnStopped;

        window.Resumed += OnResumed;

        window.Destroying += OnDestroying;

        return window;

    }

    private void OnStopped(object? sender, EventArgs e)

    {

        Preferences.Set("LastPage", Shell.Current?.CurrentPage?.GetType().Name ?? "MainPage");

    }

    private async void OnResumed(object? sender, EventArgs e)

    {

        await RestoreAppState();

    }

    private void OnDestroying(object? sender, EventArgs e)

    {

        // Final cleanup

    }

    private async Task RestoreAppState()

    {

        var lastPage = Preferences.Get("LastPage", "MainPage");

        if (Shell.Current != null)

        {

            await Shell.Current.GoToAsync($"//{lastPage}");

            // Call your data loading method

            await LoadDataAsync();

        }

    }

}

Furthermore, it's better to test on physical phone.

Nancy Vo (WICLOUD CORPORATION) 5,700 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff Moderator

2026-06-01T06:04:25.1933333+00:00

Hi @Jai Holloway ,

If you're still interested or have any questions, feel free to reach out whenever it works best for you.
Nancy Vo (WICLOUD CORPORATION) 5,700 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff Moderator

2026-06-03T02:12:35.1566667+00:00

Hi,

Please don’t hesitate to contact me if you’re still interested or have any questions.

Answer 2

Mobile operating systems routinely terminate apps that have been inactive or stopped for a long period, even if they did not crash. In .NET MAUI this is expected behavior when the app is in the stopped state for a while: the OS may reclaim resources and destroy the process. There is no supported way to force the OS to keep a “stale” app alive indefinitely.

In .NET MAUI, when the window is no longer visible the Stopped event is raised, and there is explicitly “no guarantee that an app will resume from this state, because it may be terminated by the operating system.” When the OS later destroys the app, the Destroying event is raised and the app returns to the not running state. If the user comes back after that, the app is started again from a cold start.

To handle this correctly:

Use lifecycle events to save and restore state:
- Handle Stopped to disconnect from long‑running processes and persist any necessary state.
- Handle Resumed to re‑subscribe to events and refresh visible content when the app returns from a stopped state.
- Handle Destroying to clean up resources and detach event handlers.
Implement these by deriving from Window and overriding CreateWindow in App to return the custom window, then wiring up the Created, Activated, Deactivated, Stopped, Resumed, and Destroying events.
If using Application.OnSleep/OnResume patterns, ensure important state is saved when the app goes into the background and restored when it comes back, so that a full restart after long inactivity still provides a seamless experience.

This approach does not prevent the OS from terminating the app after long inactivity, but ensures that when the app is restarted or resumed, it behaves correctly and does not appear to “exit” unexpectedly from the user’s perspective.

References:

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MAUI app exiting without crashing after inactivity

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