Believe it or not, Android development is not the easiest field of computer science to get into. Despite the operating system you choose to develop the application for, the extensive guidelines and architecture set out by the respective companies are rigid and required to follow. However, the end product of such extensive programs is much more rewarding in terms of satisfaction and revenue. To be able to write good code and achieve maximum productivity, here are the 10 best Android Development tools you should know if you are a beginner or have been doing Android development for a while.
There are multiple tools available for Android development. You must choose the right tools for you to get started. This includes the preferred IDE, programming language, and external tools. At first, you may find it difficult to get used to them; the more you practice, the better you get at developing these applications.
What is Android Development?
Android development is generally the process of creating applications (apps) that run on devices powered by the Android operating system, such as smartphones and tablets. It typically involves writing code using programming languages like Java or Kotlin that designs the user interface (UI) of the app and helps in integrating various features like data storage, networking, and user interactions. Android developers use specialized tools like Android Studio, which is an IDE provided by Google in order to build and test their apps. Once an app is developed, it can be published on the Google Play Store for users to download and use on their Android devices.
10 Best Android Development Tools in 2024
Here are the list of Best Android development tools that will help you in creating robust and stable android applications. Let’s begin…
1. Android Studio
Android Studio is by far the most important tool you need for Android Development. It was created by both Google and JetBrains and it is very similar to IntelliJ IDEA. Android Studio is a specific IDE used by Android developers. This can also be used to develop cross-platform applications using Flutter.
Android Studio allows you to have multiple features relating to Android Development like:
- Wireless Debugging: You can debug your applications on a physical device wireless, provided you are on the same network.
- Preview: For Compose Applications, you can view the preview of the specific component you are building.
- Sync with Android SDK: Android Studio has great synchronisation with your system’s available SDK and provides flawless code intellisense.
- Built-in Gradle system: Android, being a JVM application, uses the Gradle build system. The UI allows for an easier interface to run commands.
- Logcat: Your application does not work as intended. Debugging in Android is done using the system’s Logcat, an inbuilt window inside Android Studio.
- Device Manager and Profiler: Building an Android application involves analysing multiple application areas such as device usage, battery usage, memory usage, and more.
2. Kotlin Programming Language
Android development first started using Java as their preferred language of development. However, since JetBrains announced their stable release of Kotlin, we have had multiple migrations from Java to Kotlin quickly. In May 2019, Google announced Kotlin to be Android’s preferred language of development. Every new technology released since then by Google has been written in Kotlin.
But what does Kotlin have to offer? Why are so many developers choosing Kotlin over Java? Kotlin builds upon the foundation of improving the drawbacks of Java. It reduces the verbose syntax and adds functionality that Java developers have complained about for multiple years. Kotlin’s concise syntax and robustness was the primary reason for the migration of Java developers to use Kotlin for development.
Hold on. What do we do about the legacy applications written in Java? Their technology would be obsolete in the coming years. Thankfully, there is an easy fix for that. Kotlin is 100% interoperable with Java. In other words, Kotlin code can invoke and use Java classes and functions, and the other way around. You can have both Kotlin and Java code in the same codebase without any configuration costs. Old legacy code does not need to be fully replaced with Kotlin.
3. Firebase
Firebase is perhaps one of the best tools to use if you are not familiar with building backend API Servers, or you may be just too lazy to build one yourself. Firebase is a Google-run backend service that is free to use until a certain limit. This service includes databases, cloud storage, cloud functions, authentication, and more.
If you are creating an application that requires the user to be logged in, then why would you create an entire Authentication system for that if you can simply press a few buttons and write about 20 lines of code? Similarly with databases and cloud storage.
Other features that Firebase offers are Crashlytics, ML kit, and Hosting (for web apps). One should check this tool if you are into any kind of mobile development (even for websites).
4. Jetpack Compose
One of the best tools to be released by Google in the past years is Jetpack Compose. This is a brand new UI toolkit written entirely in Kotlin for Kotlin developers. Shifting from the old norm to having separate XML layouts and connecting them to the backend code, Jetpack Compose is a declarative style UI toolkit where “Composable functions” are drawn on the screen.
Jetpack Compose reduces much of the boilerplate code that was present in the old XML layout way of creating UIs. It is state-driven and also 100% interoperable with Android Views. Since its stable release, multiple users have shifted to this tool and I believe you should too.
5. GitHub
This tool is a no-brainer to use regardless of the work you are doing. Imagine you have some code that is working, but it breaks when you implement a feature. OH no! You need to revert back to the previous stage when it was working, but you forgot the exact code. Your entire code is now broken and you must start over. . . NO!
This is when you create zip files of your code every day. Again, NO! You should use a Version Control System like Git and upload your code on a platform like GitHub. Your code is saved by identity strings called “Commit Hashes” and GitHub is a cloud platform that saves your code for others to see, like your friends, peers and recruiters. They can contribute to the code you write and develop Android applications together.
6. Dagger Hilt
Dagger Hilt is a dependency injection library commonly used in the Android Development community. This is an advanced technique that is popularly used in architectures like MVVM (Model View ViewModel) and Clean Architecture.
Dependency Injection is a solution to the Dependency Inversion principle from SOLID principles in Software Engineering Design. Let’s say that you are using API X to get all your data regarding Football! Everything works fine until, oh no API X is decommissioned and no longer maintained. You need to use API Y now to get your application working. However, your code didn’t use the dependency inversion principle – i.e. you had coupled your application to use the components from API X only. You have to change the entire application so that it is compatible with API X.
With Dagger Hilt and dependency inversion principles, you can replace the old implementation of API X with the new implementation of API Y without making core changes to your application. This way of structuring your code also allows for testing individual components in isolation.
7. Coil
Coil is a brilliant library to use, especially with Kotlin and Jetpack Compose, to load images from the internet. If your application uses many images, it may be a bad idea to have the images bundled with your APK file (making the application big). Instead, you can have your images stored somewhere on the cloud, and use the Coil library to load the images when the user opens the application.
8. LeakCanary
LeakCanary is an open-source memory leak detection library to detect memory leaks in your application. What are memory leaks, you ask? Memory leaks are portions of memory that can no longer be accessed anymore. Let’s say you allocated some memory to be used in the application. However, if the application is destroyed and you did not properly clear out this memory, then this piece of memory stays in the system forever. There is no longer a pointer to this chunk; hence, it cannot be destroyed. Additionally, you cannot use the same chunk.
Memory leaks are deadly for your application. LeakCanary helps you identify when there were any memory leaks and points you to the line of code that initiated the memory leak. This is a tool important when building real applications for the store.
9. Jira
Oftentimes, you will be working in a team of developers. There would be ideas and bugs popping up every minute of development that need to be dealt with. Post-covid, most people don’t work at the same time and one cannot expect one person to fix all the bugs they spot.
JIRA is a great project management website that can be tailored to your needs and is used to track issues, plan projects and promote team collaboration. JIRA supports Agile development methodology and support features such as Agile Poker, Sprint cycles and much more. This tool shines in streamlining the development process and improves team communication.
10. Espresso
Last but not least, it is important to write tests for your application. JUnit and Mockito are great JVM libraries to use to unit test and mock your code. Android development requires UI Tests too to make sure that the UI is as intended. Espresso is the most popular library for writing UI tests for your application. There are counterparts available for testing Compose applications, which are evidently better and easier to work with.
Conclusion
It is important to have the best tools for a successful Android development career. Over my time as an Android developer, these tools changed and more tools were developed which enhanced the previous tools. 5 years from writing these articles, there would be another set of tools that are best for you. As a result, it is necessary to have an open mind regarding new developments and test them as they get increasingly popular.
