Capture traces

You can capture traces on the device, through Winscope, or through Android Debug Bridge (adb) commands.

In Winscope, you can retrieve the latest traces collected from a device during the previous session. This feature is especially helpful when facing connection issues, such as using ADB over Wi-Fi, or when Winscope closes unexpectedly. If there are no traces from the last session, Winscope displays No valid trace files found.

Error messages

Winscope shows the following messages during trace collection:

Message Description
No trace targets selected No trace checkboxes are selected.
Errors occurred during tracing:
ERROR: INVALID_LAYER_STACK, please check your display state (must be on at start of trace)
A screen recording was requested, but the display was off at the start of trace.
Errors occurred during tracing:
A specific error message received from adb command, such as Failed to find valid files for <trace types requested>
adb couldn't read the trace files, which typically happens when adb isn't running as root.
Errors occurred during tracing: Tracing time out There's a connection issue with the device.
Errors occurred during tracing: {inner error} This message covers all other errors.