Include an Emulator in Webstorm
If you’re building with React Native, chances are you’re previewing your app using the Expo Go app on your phone. That works great — until your battery hits 5%, and you’re scrambling for a charger mid-debug.
A better long-term setup could be, running an Android emulator directly on your dev machine. Android Studio gives you one, but let’s be honest: opening Android Studio just to launch the emulator feels like overkill. You open it, wait for it to load, start the emulator, then close it again. Not very efficient.
So here’s a cleaner solution: trigger the emulator directly from WebStorm, keeping everything inside your IDE. No extra clicks, no switching windows — just code and preview, side by side.
The emulator still opens in a separate window — you can’t dock it inside WebStorm. But honestly, that’s a minor trade-off for the convenience you get in my opinion.
How do you do that?
Download Android Studio
Download and install Android Studio from here
Open Android Studio’s Device Manager
Open Android Studio, then go to More actions > Virtual Device Manager
Create a new emulator
In the Device Manager, click + on the top left and select a device type as you like.
Then follow the instructions to create a new emulator.
Get the AVD-ID of your new emulator
The AVD-ID is the last part of the name of your new emulator.
You can find it in the Device Manager, when clicking on View Details under the ... of your emulator
Remember or copy the AvdId somewhere, you’ll need it later.
Add the emulator to Webstorm
Open Webstorm, go to File > Settings > Tools > External Tools or search for External Tools and click the + icon to add a new external tool.
Now you need to fill in the following fields:
Name: Enter a name for your emulator UnderTool Settings:Program: Enter the path to theemulatorexecutable on your machine.- On Windows, it’s usually located at
C:\Users\<YourUsername>\AppData\Local\Android\Sdk\emulator\emulator.exe
- On Windows, it’s usually located at
Arguments: Enter your AvdId behind the-avdflag.Working directory: If not filled in automatically, enter the path to the folder of theemulatorexecutable on your machine.
Finally click OK.
Start the emulator from Webstorm
Now you can start your emulator directly from Webstorm via
Tools > External Tools > <Your Emulator Name>
Alternative: You can also start the emulator from the Device Manager, by clicking on the Play button.
This will open a new window with the emulator.
