Restarting Android app programmatically

Please refer below code

    Intent intent = new Intent(this, YourHomeActivity.class);
    this.startActivity(intent);
    this.finishAffinity();

It is starting your home activity and dismiss all other activities. It looks like a restart to users, but the process is the same.

try this one

 Intent intent = getActivity().getBaseContext().getPackageManager().getLaunchIntentForPackage(getActivity().getBaseContext().getPackageName() );
                    intent.setFlags(Intent.FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK | Intent.FLAG_ACTIVITY_CLEAR_TASK);
                    startActivity(intent);
                    android.os.Process.killProcess(android.os.Process.myPid());
                    System.exit(0);

If you just consider to switch to your starting Activity, refer to Ricardo's answer. But this approach won't reset static context of your app and won't rebuild the Application class, so the app won't be really restarted.

If you want to completely restart your app, I can advise more radical way, using PendingIntent.

private void restartApp() {
    Intent intent = new Intent(getApplicationContext(), YourStarterActivity.class);
    int mPendingIntentId = MAGICAL_NUMBER;
    PendingIntent mPendingIntent = PendingIntent.getActivity(getApplicationContext(), mPendingIntentId, intent, PendingIntent.FLAG_CANCEL_CURRENT);
    AlarmManager mgr = (AlarmManager) getApplicationContext().getSystemService(Context.ALARM_SERVICE);
    mgr.set(AlarmManager.RTC, System.currentTimeMillis() + 100, mPendingIntent);
    System.exit(0);
}

P.S. Tried your code in my project - works well with and without finish(). So maybe you have something specific about your Activity or Fragment, you haven't written.