Cordova Android 15: StatusBar plugin deprecation, overlay behavior, back button & keyboard resize issues

[NityaSantosh26]

After upgrading to cordova-android@15.0.0, I have a few questions and issues regarding recent platform changes, especially around status bar handling and layout behavior.

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1. StatusBar plugin deprecation / replacement

As mentioned in the official announcement, the status bar plugin is no longer required and functionality is now built into the platform.
Does this mean cordova-plugin-statusbar should be completely removed in all cases?
Is window.statusbar expected to work without the plugin, or is there a new API surface?
Additionally, some functionality previously available via the plugin (e.g. text color, overlays, styling) does not seem to have a clear replacement yet.

2. StatusBarOverlaysWebView preference

Previously, we relied on:
<preference name="StatusBarOverlaysWebView" value="true/false" />
What is the equivalent behavior in Cordova Android 15?
Is this now controlled via AndroidEdgeToEdge or another preference?
If the plugin is removed, is this preference ignored?

3. Mixing plugin + new platform behavior

If we continue using cordova-plugin-statusbar alongside the new built-in handling:

Are there known conflicts?
Is this combination officially supported or discouraged?
My Observation: window.statusbar.setBackgroundColor doesn't set the color

4. Android back button behavior

Regarding issue:
apache/cordova-android#1904

Should we apply the suggested workaround?
Or is a fix planned in an upcoming release?

5. Keyboard no longer resizing WebView

After upgrading to Cordova Android 15:

When the keyboard opens, the WebView no longer resizes (it overlaps content)
This was working correctly in previous versions

Questions:
Is this expected behavior due to edge-to-edge changes?
Is there a recommended configuration or fix?

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Would appreciate clarification and guidance.
Thanks

[breautek]

StatusBarOverlaysWebView preference

I believe Android's EdgeToEdge effectively makes this behaviour fixed to "enabled", that is the statusbar is overlaid on top of the app content (that is the webview). Apps must use CSS safe-area-inset-* variables to ensure readable or interactive content is padded to clear the statusbar or other potential obstacles the device might have.

StatusBar plugin deprecation / replacement

If you support the iOS platform, I believe cordova-ios@8 implements the status bar API at the core, like Android, making the plugin completely obsolete, with the caveat noted above regarding StatusBarOverlaysWebView for android. I'm not sure if iOS has the same caveat.

Mixing plugin + new platform behavior

This wouldn't be a supported configuration and probably won't work, or will run into state conflicts.

Android back button behavior

Fixes are planned but are subjected to volunteer time.

Keyboard no longer resizing WebView

Are you sure this is a behaviour change? Can this behaviour be observed using the basic "Hello World" cordova template app? I've been using Cordova for about a decade now and I feel like the keyboard has never resized the webview by default and testing against one of my apps still using cordova-android@14 I'm seeing the webview not being resized when the keyboard is opened.

There is no cordova preference that is available to adjust the behaviour, but I think that behaviour is configurable natively via AndroidManifest.xml, which you might have a hook or <edit-config> directive or something that manipulates -- perhaps the selector is no longer working.

If it's demonstrable that the behaviour changed in the basic template app between cordova-android@14 and @15, then this could be an issue to be reported on cordova-android repo.

[NityaSantosh26]

Thanks for the clarification! @breautek

Regarding the keyboard resize behavior, I wanted to add some additional context.

Previously (prior to enabling Edge-to-Edge), using:

android:windowSoftInputMode="adjustResize"

would resize the WebView correctly when the keyboard opened.
However, with Edge-to-Edge (AndroidEdgeToEdge / modern Android behavior):

The app draws behind system bars
WindowInsets handling changes
adjustResize no longer appears to resize the WebView
The keyboard overlaps the content instead

From what I understand, this is due to how Edge-to-Edge impacts layout and insets handling in Android, rather than a direct Cordova preference.

Could you confirm:

Is this behavior expected with Edge-to-Edge enabled?
Is there a recommended approach for Cordova apps to handle keyboard insets in this mode?
For example, should apps manually handle insets via Java/Kotlin?
Or is there a planned abstraction within Cordova?
I found this: https://medium.com/androiddevelopers/make-webviews-edge-to-edge-a6ef319adfac#:~:text=Handling%20IME%20insets%20in%20WebViews,-To%20ensure%20your&text=Omitting%20IME%20insets%20will%20lead,remains%20accessible%20to%20the%20user.&text=Figure%203.,handle%20insets%20within%20the%20webpage.

And I see https://github.com/apache/cordova-android/blob/master/framework/src/org/apache/cordova/CordovaActivity.java#L221
We only handle Type.systemBars() & displayCutout() maybe adding ime() also would help with the keyboard issues.
Or some code changes can be made https://github.com/totalpaveinc/cordova-plugin-insets/blob/main/src/android/com/totalpave/cordova/inset/Inset.java code to fix this issue.

[breautek]

I haven't been able to follow Apache development closely enough to really confirm on the expected behaviour for cordova-android@15, or digging too specific... I do know that it implements a status bar view and does do some amount webview resizing to have the webview positioned and sized appropriately underneath the status bar, to replicate pre-E2E behaviour on devices, while operating in non-E2E mode. With E2E enabled, it basically treats the status bar as an overlay.

Or some code changes can be made https://github.com/totalpaveinc/cordova-plugin-insets/blob/main/src/android/com/totalpave/cordova/inset/Inset.java code to fix this issue.

Based on your PR, I implemented some changes in my own insets plugin, to address the compatibility issue with cordova-android@15 changes. I do know that with the plugin, you can pad your own content based on insets, and you can include the IME. Pre v0.4.5 you would have to declare the inset mask to include IME, but starting on 0.4.5 IME is included by default in the option bitmask.

In my testing (with my plugin) I had a simple DOM structure where the document root had 100% height -- and insets provided was used as padding for the body tag, and that was enough to ensure content stays with the safe area.