microg/GmsCore · error · IllegalArgumentException

intervalMillis must be greater than or equal to 0

Error message

intervalMillis must be greater than or equal to 0

What it means

LocationRequest.setInterval(long) throws IllegalArgumentException when intervalMillis is negative. The interval is the desired interval between location updates; negative values are invalid because the setter also derives minUpdateIntervalMillis (interval/6) and maxUpdateAgeMillis from it. The library rejects the value synchronously before mutating state.

Source

Thrown at play-services-location/src/main/java/com/google/android/gms/location/LocationRequest.java:441

    /**
     * @deprecated Use {@link LocationRequest.Builder#setMinUpdateIntervalMillis(long)} instead. May be removed in a future release.
     */
    @Deprecated
    @NonNull
    public LocationRequest setFastestInterval(long fastestIntervalMillis) throws IllegalArgumentException {
        if (fastestIntervalMillis < 0) throw new IllegalArgumentException("illegal fastest interval: " + fastestIntervalMillis);
        this.minUpdateIntervalMillis = fastestIntervalMillis;
        explicitFastestInterval = true; // FIXME: Remove
        return this;
    }

    /**
     * @deprecated Use {@link LocationRequest.Builder#setIntervalMillis(long)} instead. May be removed in a future release.
     */
    @Deprecated
    @NonNull
    public LocationRequest setInterval(long intervalMillis) throws IllegalArgumentException {
        if (intervalMillis < 0) throw new IllegalArgumentException("intervalMillis must be greater than or equal to 0");
        if (this.minUpdateIntervalMillis == this.intervalMillis / 6) {
            this.minUpdateIntervalMillis = intervalMillis / 6;
        }
        if (this.maxUpdateAgeMillis == this.intervalMillis) {
            this.maxUpdateAgeMillis = intervalMillis;
        }
        this.intervalMillis = intervalMillis;
        return this;
    }

    /**
     * @deprecated Use {@link LocationRequest.Builder#setMaxUpdateDelayMillis(long)} instead. May be removed in a future release.
     */
    @Deprecated
    @NonNull
    public LocationRequest setMaxWaitTime(long maxWaitTimeMillis) throws IllegalArgumentException {
        if (maxWaitTimeMillis < 0) throw new IllegalArgumentException("illegal max wait time: " + maxWaitTimeMillis);
        maxUpdateDelayMillis = maxWaitTimeMillis;

View on GitHub (pinned to 157c9d86ac)

Solutions

1. Validate the interval is >= 0 before calling setInterval; clamp with Math.max(0, intervalMillis).
2. If you used -1 as a sentinel, branch around the call instead of passing it.
3. Move to LocationRequest.Builder(intervalMillis) so interval and derived fields are handled consistently.

Example fix

// before
LocationRequest request = new LocationRequest().setInterval(-1); // throws
// after
long intervalMillis = rawInterval < 0 ? 10_000L : rawInterval;
LocationRequest request = new LocationRequest.Builder(intervalMillis).build();

// Java
public static long sanitizeInterval(long intervalMillis) {
    return Math.max(0L, intervalMillis);
}
// request.setInterval(sanitizeInterval(rawInterval));

static boolean isValidIntervalMillis(long millis) { return millis >= 0; }

// Java
try {
    request.setInterval(intervalMillis);
} catch (IllegalArgumentException e) {
    Log.w("LocationReq", "Invalid interval, falling back to 10s");
    request.setInterval(10_000L);
}

When it happens

Trigger: Calling the deprecated LocationRequest.setInterval() with a negative long, e.g. setInterval(-1), or with a value computed/parsed as negative.

Common situations: Sentinel -1 for 'unspecified' interval; unit mixups (seconds vs millis) yielding negative after conversion math; negative values from server or user config; migrating old code that used -1 defaults.

Understand the failure class

Background: "Must be a positive integer", "Invalid value", "Unsupported": the invalid-argument-value error family, when a library rejects the value you pass — this error's family across 35 libraries.

Related errors

• illegal fastest interval:
• illegal max wait time:
• invalid numUpdates: {maxUpdates}
• invalid displacement: {smallestDisplacementMeters}
• durationMillis must be greater than 0

AI-assisted analysis of microg/GmsCore@157c9d86ac (2026-09-06). Data as JSON: /api/errors/30d2913de7886d67. Report an issue: GitHub.