SkieDoes location keep working when the screen is off or the app is in the background?
Yes. Skie reports from a protected background service, so location continues with the screen off and with other apps in front. The service is watched by a watchdog worker and a repeating alarm, and the Skie app is exempt from battery optimisation. It still needs a data connection to send the position, and it pauses when the device is offline.
Android is quick to stop background apps to save battery. A location feature that depends on the screen being on would be useless for a tablet sitting in a bag or a phone in a pocket. Skie avoids this by running as the device owner and keeping its reporting in a protected service.
Several pieces work together. A background service does the reporting. A watchdog worker restarts it if Android stops it. A repeating alarm about every four minutes reports presence. The Skie app is exempted from battery optimisation, and a sync happens straight away when the internet returns or when the screen turns on after a stale period.
The person using the device cannot stop the app. Force stop, clearing data and disabling are blocked on managed apps, and the location permission itself is granted by Skie rather than by the user. So switching location off from Settings is not something a student or staff member can do.
There are honest limits. With no Wi-Fi or mobile data, the position cannot travel, so the dashboard shows the last pin and its time. If the device is powered off, nothing reports. Skie does not publish figures for battery impact or location accuracy, and you should test on your own device models during a pilot.
Practical tip: when a device appears quiet, read the last-seen time before concluding anything. A screen-off tablet that checked in a few minutes ago is behaving normally.