The steps below provide an overview of how to get started with the Android SDK. For detailed instructions, start with the Installing guide.
0. Prepare your development computer
Read the System Requirements document and make sure that your development computer meets the hardware and software requirements for the Android SDK. Install any additional software needed before downloading the Android SDK. In particular, if you plan to develop Android applications in the Eclipse IDE using the ADT Plugin (see below), make sure that you have the correct version of Eclipse installed.
1. Download and install the SDK starter package
Select a starter package from the table at the top of this page and download it to your development computer. To install the SDK, simply unpack the starter package to a safe location and then add the location to your PATH.
2. Install the ADT Plugin for Eclipse
If you are developing in Eclipse, set up a remote update site and install the Android Development Tools (ADT) plugin. For detailed instructions, see Installing and Updating ADT.
3. Add Android platforms to your SDK
Use the Android SDK and AVD Manager, included in the SDK starter package, to add one or more Android platforms (for example, Android 1.6 or Android 2.0) to your SDK. In most cases, you will want to download multiple platforms, so that you can build your application on the lowest version you want to support, but test against higher versions that you intend the application to run on. Information about each platform is available at left, under "Downloadable SDK Components."
To launch the Android SDK and AVD Manager on Windows, execute SDK
Setup.exe, at the root of the SDK directory. On Mac OS X or Linux,
execute the android tool in the <sdk>/tools/
folder. For more information about how to add platforms and other components,
see Adding SDK Components.
4. Get the latest documentation
If you develop while offline, use the Android SDK and AVD Manager to download the latest documentation package. The documentation covers all versions of the API and lets you filter out those versions that your application won't support. Once installed, the documentation is also available to you directly from the Eclipse IDE.
5. Download other SDK components
You can use the Android SDK and AVD Manager to download other SDK components, such as the SDK add-ons. An SDK add-on provides a development environment for an Android external library or a customized Android system image. For example, the Google APIs Add-On lets you develop an application that takes advantage of the Google Maps external library.
6. Get started with an application project
Once you've set up your SDK, the next step is to start a new application project or move existing applications into the new SDK.
If you are new to Android, you can use the Hello World tutorial to get started quickly. Next Steps offers other suggestions of how to begin. Welcome!
