Easiest way to use SVG in Android?

I have found a myriad of libraries in order to use svg in Android and avoid the frustrating creation of different resolutions and dropping files for each resolution, this becomes very annoying when the app has many icons or images.

Can anyone be as kind to give a step by step process of the simplest to use library for using SVG in Android, I'm sure this will help many others too.

Also I use Android Studio and Illustrator for generating my icons and images.

Solution 1:

First you need to import svg files by following simple steps.

Right click on your project's drawable folder (app/res/drawable)
Click new
Select Vector Asset

If image is available in your computer then select local svg file. After that select the image path and an option to change the size of the image is also available at the right side of dialog if you want to. In this way svg image is imported in your project.

After that for using this image use the same procedure:

@drawable/yourimagename

Solution 2:

UPDATE: DO NOT use this old answer, better use this: https://stackoverflow.com/a/39266840/4031815

Ok after some hours of research I found svg-android to be quite easy to use, so I'm leaving here step by step instructions:

download lib from: https://code.google.com/p/svg-android/downloads/list Latest version at the moment of writing this is: svg-android-1.1.jar
Put jar in lib dir.
Save your *.svg file in res/drawable dir (In illustrator is as easy as pressing Save as and select svg)

Code the following in your activity using the svg library:

ImageView imageView = (ImageView) findViewById(R.id.imgView);
SVG svg = SVGParser.getSVGFromResource(getResources(), R.drawable.example);
//The following is needed because of image accelaration in some devices such as samsung
imageView.setLayerType(View.LAYER_TYPE_SOFTWARE, null);
imageView.setImageDrawable(svg.createPictureDrawable());

You can reduce boilerplate code like this

Very easy I made a simple class to contain past code and reduce boilerplate code, like this:

import android.app.Activity;
import android.view.View;
import android.widget.ImageView;

import com.larvalabs.svgandroid.SVG;
import com.larvalabs.svgandroid.SVGParser;

public class SvgImage {

    private static ImageView imageView;
    private Activity activity;
    private SVG svg;
    private int xmlLayoutId;
    private int drawableId;


    public SvgImage(Activity activity, int layoutId, int drawableId) {
        imageView = (ImageView) activity.findViewById(layoutId);
        svg = SVGParser.getSVGFromResource(activity.getResources(), drawableId);
        //Needed because of image accelaration in some devices such as samsung
        imageView.setLayerType(View.LAYER_TYPE_SOFTWARE, null);
        imageView.setImageDrawable(svg.createPictureDrawable());
    }
}

Now I can call it like this in activity:

    SvgImage rainSVG = new SvgImage(MainActivity.this, R.id.rainImageView, R.drawable.rain);
    SvgImage thunderSVG = new SvgImage(MainActivity.this, R.id.thunderImageView, R.drawable.thunder);
    SvgImage oceanSVG = new SvgImage(MainActivity.this, R.id.oceanImageView, R.drawable.ocean);
    SvgImage fireSVG = new SvgImage(MainActivity.this, R.id.fireImageView, R.drawable.fire);
    SvgImage windSVG = new SvgImage(MainActivity.this, R.id.windImageView,R.drawable.wind);
    SvgImage universeSVG = new SvgImage(MainActivity.this, R.id.universeImageView,R.drawable.universe);

Solution 3:

Android Studio supports SVG from 1.4 onwards

Here is a video on how to import.

Solution 4:

Rather than adding libraries which increases your apk size, I will suggest you to convert Svg to drawable using http://inloop.github.io/svg2android/ . and add vectorDrawables.useSupportLibrary = true in gradle,

Solution 5:

you need to convert SVG to XML to use in android project.

1.1 you can do this with this site: http://inloop.github.io/svg2android/ but it does not support all the features of SVG like some gradients.

1.2 you can convert via android studio but it might use some features that only supports API 24 and higher that cuase crashe your app in older devices.

and add vectorDrawables.useSupportLibrary = true in gradle file and use like this:

<android.support.v7.widget.AppCompatImageView
                android:layout_width="match_parent"
                android:layout_height="match_parent"
                app:srcCompat="@drawable/ic_item1" />

use this library https://github.com/MegatronKing/SVG-Android that supports these features : https://github.com/MegatronKing/SVG-Android/blob/master/support_doc.md

add this code in application class:

public void onCreate() {
    SVGLoader.load(this)
}

and use the SVG like this :

<ImageView
    android:layout_width="wrap_content"
    android:layout_height="wrap_content"
    android:src="@drawable/ic_android_red"/>