Mobile apps can be interrupted at any time by incoming calls, OS memory pressure, or user actions. A strong engineer should know how to preserve a good user experience when the app is paused, backgrounded, or killed.
Explain how you would handle the lifecycle of a mobile application and save state when it is abruptly sent to the background.
Your answer should cover:
The interviewer expects a practical systems explanation rather than platform-specific trivia. Discuss lifecycle callbacks/events, in-memory vs persistent state, trade-offs around performance and consistency, and common mistakes such as saving too much or relying on background execution guarantees.