Unlocking the Power of Android Activities: A Guide to Choosing the Right Type For Custom Activities

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When it comes to Android development, developing a good understanding of the nuances of Android Activities is key. Activities are generally the first component we create when starting a new Android project. They serve as the building blocks of any Android application, representing user interfaces or individual screens. They also serve as the basis of more advanced concepts like Single Activity Architecture and Navigation Component.

android for beginners

Beginners to Android development typically struggle with selecting the right type when creating a new activity. 

In this guide, we will explore the common types of Activities in Android and provide insights for their usage which will be useful not only when creating our first activity in a new project but also when creating new activities in existing projects.

Inheritance Diagram

In Android, developers can extend various types of Activity classes to create their own custom activities. Here are the some of the major and commonly used activity classes provided by Android.

The below diagram shows the inheritance relationship between the different major Activity types:

 Activity Types Detailed Analysis

  1. Activity
    • The base class for all activities providing a default implementation of the activity lifecycle (methods like onCreate, onResume, onDestroy and others.
    • Generally, it is not recommended to extend this class directly 
  2. ComponentActivity
    • It has all the functionality we need for a Compose-only application 
    • It provides APIs that enable Jetpack Compose, Architecture Components, and support for backporting new features introduced in Android 13
  3. FragmentActivity  
    • It is specially designed to support the use of Fragments. If our application heavily uses fragments for UI design or for supporting multiple screen sizes, FragmentActivity is the way to go 
    • It main purpose is to provide backward compatibility for fragments on Android versions earlier than Honeycomb (Android 3.0 or API level 11) when fragments were first introduced
    •   If our application needs nested fragments (a feature introduced in API level 17) and our minimum SDK is less than 17, we can consider using FragmentActivity 
  4. AppCompatActivity 
    • It is part of AndroidX library and provides backward compatible implementations of newer Android features 
    • It provides compatibility with the latest Material Design guidelines
    • AppCompatActivity provides support for Toolbars and ActionBars and options for customizations
    • If we want to take advantage of the latest Android features and libraries, such as ViewModels and other AndroidX components, AppCompatActivity is the more appropriate choice.
    • Since it extends FragmentActivity, it will inherit its functionalities and hence nested fragments etc. will be supported by AppCompatActivity as well
    • Recommended for most situations
  5. ActionBarActivity
    • Extends AppCompatActivity to provide ActionBar capabilities
    • Deprecated, not recommended

Phew! That was a lot to take in! So, where does all that information leave us?

At this point, if you are a beginner, you might lose patience and say: Cut short the jargons and just tell me the name of the Activity type to extend!

The short answer is “AppCompatActivity”.

It is the type which is recommended for almost all scenarios out there. It is part of AndroidX, provides backward compatibility and support for Material Design and ActionBars, extends from FragmentActivity and ComponentActivity, thus inheriting their useful features and the list goes on.

Unless we have specific requirements or constraints where it makes sense to go with some other option, “AppCompatActivity” is the clear winner.

Hope you learned something new, see you in the next post! 

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