Android: Share plain text using intent (to all messaging apps)

Solution 1:

Use the code as:

    /*Create an ACTION_SEND Intent*/
    Intent intent = new Intent(android.content.Intent.ACTION_SEND);
    /*This will be the actual content you wish you share.*/
    String shareBody = "Here is the share content body";
    /*The type of the content is text, obviously.*/
    intent.setType("text/plain");
    /*Applying information Subject and Body.*/
    intent.putExtra(android.content.Intent.EXTRA_SUBJECT, getString(R.string.share_subject));
    intent.putExtra(android.content.Intent.EXTRA_TEXT, shareBody);
    /*Fire!*/
    startActivity(Intent.createChooser(intent, getString(R.string.share_using)));

Solution 2:

New way of doing this would be using ShareCompat.IntentBuilder like so:

// Create and fire off our Intent in one fell swoop
ShareCompat.IntentBuilder
        // getActivity() or activity field if within Fragment
        .from(this) 
        // The text that will be shared
        .setText(textToShare)
        // most general text sharing MIME type
        .setType("text/plain") 
        .setStream(uriToContentThatMatchesTheArgumentOfSetType)
        /*
         * [OPTIONAL] Designate a URI to share. Your type that 
         * is set above will have to match the type of data
         * that your designating with this URI. Not sure
         * exactly what happens if you don't do that, but 
         * let's not find out.
         * 
         * For example, to share an image, you'd do the following:
         *     File imageFile = ...;
         *     Uri uriToImage = ...; // Convert the File to URI
         *     Intent shareImage = ShareCompat.IntentBuilder.from(activity)
         *       .setType("image/png")
         *       .setStream(uriToImage)
         *       .getIntent();
         */
        .setEmailTo(arrayOfStringEmailAddresses)
        .setEmailTo(singleStringEmailAddress)
        /*
         * [OPTIONAL] Designate the email recipients as an array
         * of Strings or a single String
         */ 
        .setEmailTo(arrayOfStringEmailAddresses)
        .setEmailTo(singleStringEmailAddress)
        /*
         * [OPTIONAL] Designate the email addresses that will be 
         * BCC'd on an email as an array of Strings or a single String
         */ 
        .addEmailBcc(arrayOfStringEmailAddresses)
        .addEmailBcc(singleStringEmailAddress)
        /* 
         * The title of the chooser that the system will show
         * to allow the user to select an app
         */
        .setChooserTitle(yourChooserTitle)
        .startChooser();

If you have any more questions about using ShareCompat, I highly recommend this great article from Ian Lake, an Android Developer Advocate at Google, for a more complete breakdown of the API. As you'll notice, I borrowed some of this example from that article.

If that article doesn't answer all of your questions, there is always the Javadoc itself for ShareCompat.IntentBuilder on the Android Developers website. I added more to this example of the API's usage on the basis of clemantiano's comment.