The error: “React Native – Play Store Warning “Starting May 5th you must let us know why your app requires broad storage access”” is a common error that can show up in many ways. In this blog, we will go through some of the ways you can fix this issue. Read on.

When The Error: “React Native – Play Store Warning “Starting May 5th you must let us know why your app requires broad storage access”” Happen?

You have a react-native app live in the play store. You have got this important warning message from the play store and if you don’t solve this error your app will be excluded from the play store. Here is your warning message: Play Store Warning “Starting May 5th you must let us know why your app requires broad storage access”.

How To Solve The Error “React Native – Play Store Warning “Starting May 5th you must let us know why your app requires broad storage access”” 

Approach 1: Include storage access permission in the manifest.xml file

Including storage access permission in the manifest.xml file is a great way to solve the error ”React Native – Play Store Warning “Starting May 5th you must let us know why your app requires broad storage access””. Let’s follow these steps below:

• This solution will be able to solve the issue even when aiming at Android 11. 
• From May 5th, you must include storage access permission in the manifest.xml file to fix this problem. 
• So, starting May 5th, just upgrade your app’s manifest file to declare all files access (MANAGE_EXTERNAL_STORAGE) permission.
• Furthermore, as of May 5th, fulfill the All files access permission declaration under Play Console.

After you finish above steps, your error will be completely resolved. So, what are you waiting without applying it for your problem?

Approach 2: Include the following line in your AndroidManifest.xml

It’s most likely that you’re invoking MANAGE_EXTERNAL_STORAGE from a React-Native dependency.

1. Access /YourProject/node_modules/rn-fetch-blob/android/src/main/AndroidManifest.xml
2. Include the following line in your AndroidManifest.xml.

<!-- Required to read and write the expansion files on shared storage -->

<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.WRITE_EXTERNAL_STORAGE" />

Many people had this dependence RNFetchBlob rn-fetch-blob even when not utilizing it, therefore, look for an external dependency that uses the WRITE_EXTERNAL_STORAGE or android: requestLegacyExternalStorage=”true”.

Approach 3: Set requestLegacyExternalStorage=true

Excepting two mentioned approaches above, there is another soltution for you to solve the error ”React Native – Play Store Warning “Starting May 5th you must let us know why your app requires broad storage access””. In the case you are attempting to target Android API 29, you only need to put requestLegacyExternalStorage=true in the manifest file of your app. However, by November, you have to update to Android API 30.

Let’s try this method, it will not make you disappointed.

Conclusion

We hope you enjoyed our article about the error. With this knowledge, we know that you can fix your error: “React Native – Play Store Warning “Starting May 5th you must let us know why your app requires broad storage access”” quickly by following these steps! If you still have any other questions about fixing this syntax error, please leave a comment below. Thank you for reading!

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