IssueTracker

Same problem here.

In config.ini, I have set:
sdcard.size=500 MiB

In hardware-qemu.ini, I have set:
hw.sdCard = true

The issue is that the sdcard is not writable. You can workaround this by running:

adb shell
su
mount -o rw,remount rootfs /
chmod 777 /mnt/sdcard

But those settings are lost once the emulator is closed.

I can confirm this an issue I am also having on Android Studio 2.3.

The second comment (https://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=240155#c2) of making the SD card writable, does work for me. The camera continues to say "Insert an SD card before using the camera"

API 15 galaxy nexus sd card not detected in storage settings

Is there a solution to this at this point of time?
Having the same issue.
Can't download anything nor take any pictures even the sd card writable workaround does not work for me (API 17).

For some reason the sdcard is *not* being mounted in the android system (API 16,17 only, 18 onwards WORKS AS EXPECTED) within the emulator.
adb shell
root@android:/ # df
Filesystem             Size   Used   Free   Blksize
/dev                   757M    68K   757M   4096
/mnt/secure            757M     0K   757M   4096
/mnt/asec              757M     0K   757M   4096
/mnt/obb               757M     0K   757M   4096
/system                532M   349M   183M   4096
/cache                  60M    40K    60M   4096
/data                    1G    83M     1G   4096

The above is for a API 17 img, same thing happens with both "Studio Managed" sdcard as well as sdcard img file created both via the GUI and mksdcard.
No clues at all in the dmesg, in logcat there is only:

05-12 03:22:54.430 1154-1154/? D/Vold: Volume sdcard state changing -1 (Initializing) -> 0 (No-Media)
05-12 03:22:56.380 1486-1499/system_process D/MountService: got storage path: /mnt/sdcard description: USB storage primary: true removable: false emulated: false mtpReserve: 0 allowMassStorage: false maxFileSize: 0
05-12 03:22:56.380 1486-1499/system_process D/MountService: addVolumeLocked() StorageVolume [mStorageId=0 mPath=/mnt/sdcard mDescriptionId=17040615 mPrimary=true mRemovable=false mEmulated=false mMtpReserveSpace=0 mAllowMassStorage=false mMaxFileSize=0 mOwner=null]
05-12 03:22:56.390 1486-1522/system_process D/MountService: volume state changed for /mnt/sdcard (null -> removed)
05-12 03:22:56.400 1486-1522/system_process I/PackageManager: No secure containers on sdcard
05-12 03:22:58.180 1738-1957/android.process.media W/MediaScanner: Error opening directory '/mnt/sdcard/', skipping: Permission denied.

Just updated to Emulator 26.0.3 and still happening as above.

Hello, I have the same problem. Anyone find a solution?

Unfortunately I had to go back to Android Studio 2.2 as I have to work with a SD card.

Re: #8 and #9, please refrain from "me too" comments. Each new comment sends out an email to everyone who is subscribed to the defect (and my sincere apologies to everyone for the email that this comment generated!). Please just star the defect to let the devs know that you're interested in it and add a comment only if you have additional debugging/troubleshooting information to add.

Having same issue with API 15 emulator

Have this problem with API 17 - but running with classic engine from command line works for me:

LD_PRELOAD='/usr/$LIB/libstdc++.so.6' ./emulator @Nexus_S_API_17 -verbose -engine classic

Thank you #12! I can confirm that emulators as far back as API 15 (my earliest supported API) work with that advice.
Specifically, if you need sdcard in the older APIs,

1- I have to use Android Studio (v3.1.4 for me) to create the AVD,
2- then I must boot it once via Android Studio or I will get an error about failed phone encryption, but the sdcard won't be mounted
3- then I may boot the standalone emulator from the command line using the classic engine. I did not need to do the LD_PRELOAD though (Ubuntu 18.04LTS, for me)

My command looked like this and returned this emulator version, working correctly with sdcard access:
$ANDROID_SDK_HOME/emulator/emulator @Nexus_4_API_15 -verbose -engine classic
emulator: Android emulator version 27.3.9.0 (build_id 4899998) (CL:e7b1c928a596dd490b990f4532055950f1409e49)

Hi, I can't reproduce this with the canary emulator 29.2.3 with the latest revision of the API 16 x86 Google APIs image.

Thanks for checking, and that's good news - this was logged (and my comment with testing results added) prior to all the work on the emulators, and I've noticed several things in the area that did not work in the past are working now, so it's possible this was resolved as well. I'll re-check in a bit and post back results as my app supports API15+ at the moment and I need these to work. Cheers