This page describes how to install the Android SDK and set up your development environment for the first time.
If you encounter any problems during installation, see the Troubleshooting section at the bottom of this page.
If you are currently using the Android 1.6 SDK or later and want to update to the latest tools or platforms, you do not need to install a new SDK. Instead, you can simply update the individual components in your SDK using the Android SDK and AVD Manager tool. For information about how to do that, see Updating SDK Components
If you are using Android 1.5 SDK or earlier, you should install a new SDK as described in this document and move your application projects to the new SDK environment.
Before getting started with the Android SDK, take a moment to confirm that your development computer meets the System Requirements. In particular, you may need to install the JDK before continuing, if it's not already installed on your computer.
If you will be developing in Eclipse with the Android Development Tools (ADT) Plugin — the recommended path if you are new to Android — make sure that you have a suitable version of Eclipse installed on your computer (3.4 or newer is recommended). If you need to install Eclipse, you can download it from this location:
http://www.eclipse.org/downloads/
A Java or RCP version of Eclipse is recommended. For Eclipse 3.5, the "Eclipse Classic" version is recommended.
The first step in setting up your environment for developing Android applications is downloading the Android SDK starter package. The starter package is not a full development environment — it includes only the core SDK Tools, which you can use to download the rest of the SDK components.
You can get the latest version of the SDK starter package from the SDK download page. Make sure to download the package that is appropriate for your development computer.
After downloading, unpack the Android SDK archive to a safe location on your
machine. By default, the SDK files are unpacked into a directory named
android-sdk-<machine-platform>. Make a note of the name and
location of the unpacked SDK directory on your system — you will need to
refer to the SDK directory later, when setting up the ADT plugin or when using
the SDK tools.
Optionally, you may want to add the location of the SDK's primary
tools directory to your system PATH. The primary
tools/ directory is located at the root of the SDK folder. Adding
tools to your path lets you run Android Debug Bridge (adb) and the
other command line tools without needing to
supply the full path to the tools directory.
~/.bash_profile or ~/.bashrc file. Look
for a line that sets the PATH environment variable and add the
full path to the tools/ directory to it. If you don't
see a line setting the path, you can add one:export PATH=${PATH}:<your_sdk_dir>/tools.bash_profile and
proceed as for Linux. You can create the .bash_profile if
you haven't already set one up on your machine. tools/ directory to the path. If you will be using the Eclipse IDE as your development environment, the next section describes how to install the Android Development Tools (ADT) plugin and set up Eclipse. If you choose not to use Eclipse, you can develop Android applications in an IDE of your choice and then compile, debug and deploy using the tools included in the SDK (skip to Adding Platforms and Other Components).
Android offers a custom plugin for the Eclipse IDE, called Android Development Tools (ADT), that is designed to give you a powerful, integrated environment in which to build Android applications. It extends the capabilites of Eclipse to let you quickly set up new Android projects, create an application UI, add components based on the Android Framework API, debug your applications using the Android SDK tools, and even export signed (or unsigned) APKs in order to distribute your application. In general, developing in Eclipse with ADT is a highly recommended approach and is the fastest way to get started with Android.
If you'd like to use ADT for developing Android applications, install it now. Read ADT Plugin for Eclipse for step-by-step installation instructions, then return here to continue with the last step in setting up your SDK: adding platforms and other components.
If you prefer to work in an IDE other than Eclipse, you do not need to install Eclipse or ADT, instead, you can directly use the SDK tools to build and debug your application.
The Android SDK and AVD Manager is a tool that you will use often, to add components to your SDK environment and manage Android Virtual Devices.
The tool is pre-installed in your SDK. See Adding SDK Components for details on how to launch and use the tool.
The last step in setting up your SDK is using a tool included the SDK starter package — the Android SDK and AVD Manager — to download essential components into your development environment. Read the information below to understand what components you'll need, then see Adding SDK Components for step-by-step instructions on how to launch the Android SDK and AVD Manager and download the components into your environment.
The SDK uses a modular structure that separates the major parts of the SDK — Android platform versions, add-ons, tools, samples, and the API documentation — into a set of separately installable components. The SDK starter package, which you've already downloaded, includes only a single component: the latest version of the SDK Tools. To develop any Android application, you also need to download at least one Android platform into your environment, although downloading additional components is highly recommended. See Which components do I need? for information about which components are required and which are optional.
The SDK repository offers these types of components:
<sdk>/tools/ directory. com.google.android.maps library. You can also add additional
repositories, so that you can download other SDK add-ons, where available. To download components, use the graphical UI of the Android SDK and AVD Manager, shown in Figure 1, to browse the SDK repository, select new or updated components for download, and then install the selected components in your SDK environment.
Figure 1. The Android SDK and AVD Manager's Available Packages panel, which shows the SDK components that are available for you to download into your environment.
The SDK repository contains a range of components that you can download. Use the table below to determine which components you need, based on whether you want to set up a basic (but functionnal) development environment or a recommended or full development environment:
| Environment | SDK Component | Comments |
|---|---|---|
| Basic | SDK Tools | If you've installed the SDK starter package, then you already have this component preinstalled. The SDK Tools component is required — you can't develop or build an application without it. |
| SDK platform | You need to download at least one platform into your environment, so that you will be able to compile your application and set up an Android Virtual Device (AVD) to run it on (in the emulator). To start with, just download the latest version of the platform. Later, if you plan to publish your application, you will want to download other platforms as well, so that you can test your application on the full range of Android platform versions that your customers are using. | |
| + | ||
| Recommended | Documentation | The Documentation component is useful because it lets you work offline and also look up API reference information from inside Eclipse. |
| Samples | The Samples components give you source code that you can use to learn about Android, load as a project and run, or reuse in your own app. Note that multiple samples components are available — one for each Android platform version. When you are choosing a samples component to download, select the one whose API Level matches the API Level of the Android platform that you plan to use. | |
| Usb Driver | The Usb Driver component is needed only if you are developing on Windows and have an Android-powered device on which you want to install your application for debugging and testing. For Mac OS X and Linux platforms, no special driver is needed. | |
| + | ||
| Full | Google APIs | The Google APIs add-on gives your application access to the Maps external library, which makes it easy to display and manipulate Maps data in your application. |
| Additional SDK Platforms | If you plan to publish your application, you will want to download additional platforms corresponding to the Android platform versions on which you want the application to run. The recommended approach is to compile your application against the lowest version you want to support, but test it against higher versions that you intend the application to run on. You can test your applications on different platforms by running in an Android Virtual Device (AVD) on the Android emulator. | |
For step-by-step instructions on how to use the Android SDK and AVD Manager to add components, see the Adding SDK Components document.
For revision notes and other detailed information about individual SDK components, see the documents listed under "Downloadable SDK Components" in the navigation at left.
Once you've installed the SDK and downloaded the platforms, documentation, and add-ons that you need, open the SDK directory and take a look at what's inside.
The table below describes the full SDK directory contents, with components installed.
| Name | Description | ||
|---|---|---|---|
add-ons/ |
Contains add-ons to the Android SDK development environment, which let you develop against external libraries that are available on some devices. | ||
docs/ |
A full set of documentation in HTML format, including the Developer's Guide,
API Reference, and other information. To read the documentation, load the
file offline.html in a web browser. |
||
platforms/ |
Contains a set of Android platform versions that you can develop applications against, each in a separate directory. | ||
<platform>/ |
Platform version directory, for example "android-1.6". All platform version directories contain a similar set of files and subdirectory structure. | ||
data/ |
Storage area for default fonts and resource definitions. | ||
images/ |
Storage area for default disk images, including the Android system image, the default userdata image, the default ramdisk image, and more. The images are used in emulator sessions. | ||
skins/ |
A set of emulator skins available for the platform version. Each skin is designed for a specific screen resolution. | ||
templates/ |
Storage area for file templates used by the SDK development tools. | ||
tools/ |
Any development tools that are specific to the platform version. | ||
android.jar |
The Android library used when compiling applications against this platform version. | ||
samples/ |
Sample code and apps that are specific to platform version. | tools/ |
Contains the set of development and profiling tools available to you, such
as the emulator, the android tool, adb, ddms, and more. |
SDK Readme.txt |
A file that explains how to perform the initial setup of your SDK, including how to launch the Android SDK and AVD Manager tool on all platforms | ||
SDK Setup.exe |
Windows SDK only. A shortcut that launches the Android SDK and AVD Manager tool, which you use to add components to your SDK. | ||
Once you have completed installation, you are ready to begin developing applications. Here are a few ways you can get started:
Set up the Hello World application
Following the Hello World tutorial is an essential first step in getting started with Android development.
Learn about Android
Explore the development tools
Follow the Notepad tutorial
Following the Notepad tutorial is an excellent second step in getting started with Android development.
Explore some code
<sdk>/samples/<platform>/. Visit the Android developer groups
ia32-libs package using
apt-get::
apt-get install ia32-libs
apt-get install sun-java6-jdk