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Installation

Before starting to develop your application with the Maps SDK, you'll need to configure your credentials and add the SDK as a dependency.

This document describes the steps to install the stable version of the Maps SDK, but you can also use the nightly build (i.e. SNAPSHOT) or the beta version, if one is available.

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Android's 64K method count limit
If your application is over the 64K method limit, you can shrink, obfuscate, and optimize your code with R8 or ProGuard. If those steps do not lower your method count below 64K, you can also enable multidex.

Configure credentials

Before installing the SDK, you will need to gather the appropriate credentials. The SDK requires two pieces of sensitive information from your Mapbox account. If you don't have a Mapbox account: sign up and navigate to your Account page. You'll need:

  • A public access token: From your account's tokens page, you can either copy your default public token or click the Create a token button to create a new public token.
  • A secret access token with the Downloads:Read scope.
    1. From your account's tokens page, click the Create a token button.
    2. From the token creation page, give your token a name and make sure the box next to the Downloads:Read scope is checked.
    3. Click the Create token button at the bottom of the page to create your token.
    4. The token you've created is a secret token, which means you will only have one opportunity to copy it somewhere secure.

You should not expose these access tokens in publicly-accessible source code where unauthorized users might find them. Instead, you should store them somewhere safe on your computer and take advantage of Gradle properties to make sure they're only added when your app is compiled. Once this configuration step has been completed, you will be able to reference your credentials in other parts of your app.

Configure your secret token

To avoid exposing your secret token, add it as an environment variable:

  1. Find or create a gradle.properties file in your Gradle user home folder. The folder can be found at «USER_HOME»/.gradle. Once you have found or created the file, its path should be «USER_HOME»/.gradle/gradle.properties. You can read more about Gradle properties in the official Gradle documentation.
  2. Add your secret token your gradle.properties file:
MAPBOX_DOWNLOADS_TOKEN=YOUR_SECRET_MAPBOX_ACCESS_TOKEN

Configure your public token

There are many ways to configure your public access token. Many of the examples and code snippets on this site assume your token is stored in a file in your project with other string values. If you would like to manage your public access token this way, open your project's R.strings.xml file and add the following string resource, replacing YOUR_MAPBOX_ACCESS_TOKEN with your public Mapbox API token:

<string name="mapbox_access_token">YOUR_MAPBOX_ACCESS_TOKEN</string>

If you ever need to rotate your access token, you will need to update the token value in your R.strings.xml file.

Configure permissions

If you plan to display the user's location on the map or get the user's location information you will need to add the ACCESS_COARSE_LOCATION permission in your application's AndroidManifest.xml. You also need to add ACCESS_FINE_LOCATION permissions if you need access to precise location. You can check whether the user has granted location permission and request permissions if the user hasn't granted them yet using the PermissionsManager.

<manifest ... >
  <!-- Always include this permission -->
  <uses-permission android:name="android.permission.ACCESS_COARSE_LOCATION" />

  <!-- Include only if your app benefits from precise location access. -->
  <uses-permission android:name="android.permission.ACCESS_FINE_LOCATION" />
</manifest>
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Access token best practices

Learn how to keep access tokens private in mobile apps.

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Add the dependency

Mapbox provides the Maps SDK via Maven.

To add the Mapbox Maps SDK as a dependency, you will need to configure your build to download the Maps SDK from Mapbox directly. This requires a valid username and password.

  1. Open your project in Android Studio.

  2. Declare the Mapbox Downloads API's releases/maven endpoint. To download the Maps SDK dependency, you must authenticate your request with a valid username and password. In the previous section, you added the password to a gradle.properties file in your Gradle user home folder. The username field should always be "mapbox". It should not be your personal username used to create the secret token. Where you make these declarations depend on the versions of Android Studio and Gradle your project is using:

    • Android Studio less than Arctic Fox (2020.3.1) and Gradle less than v6.0: Open up your project-level build.gradle file, and add the code below to declare the endpoint in the repositories block:

      allprojects {
          repositories {
              maven {
                    url 'https://api.mapbox.com/downloads/v2/releases/maven'
                    authentication {
                        basic(BasicAuthentication)
                    }
                    credentials {
                      // Do not change the username below.
                      // This should always be `mapbox` (not your username).
                        username = "mapbox"
                        // Use the secret token you stored in gradle.properties as the password
                        password = project.properties['MAPBOX_DOWNLOADS_TOKEN'] ?: ""
                    }
                }
          }
      }
      
    • Android Studio Arctic Fox (2020.3.1) or later and Gradle v6.0 or later: You may need to make these declarations in your settings.gradle file instead. If you see build errors with the build.gradle process described above, then instead declare the Mapbox's Maven repository in your settings.gradle file like below:

      dependencyResolutionManagement {
          repositoriesMode.set(RepositoriesMode.FAIL_ON_PROJECT_REPOS)
          repositories {
              google()
              mavenCentral()
              maven {
                url 'https://api.mapbox.com/downloads/v2/releases/maven'
                authentication {
                  basic(BasicAuthentication)
                }
                credentials {
                  // Do not change the username below.
                  // This should always be `mapbox` (not your username).
                  username = "mapbox"
                  // Use the secret token you stored in gradle.properties as the password
                  password = MAPBOX_DOWNLOADS_TOKEN
                }
              }
          }
      }
      
  3. Open up your module-level build.gradle file.

  4. Make sure that your project's minSdkVersion is at API 21 or higher.

    android {
      ...
      defaultConfig {
          minSdkVersion 21
      }
    }
    
  5. Under dependencies, add a new build rule for the latest Mapbox Maps SDK for Android.

    dependencies {
      implementation 'com.mapbox.maps:android:10.13.0'
    }
    
  6. Because you've edited your Gradle files, Android Studio will ask you whether you want to sync the Gradle files. You can sync now.

Note: You might have mismatching Gradle dependencies once you add the Mapbox Maps SDK for Android. If necessary, you can use exclude group to remove certain dependencies:

implementation ('com.mapbox.maps:android:10.13.0'){
    exclude group: 'group_name', module: 'module_name'
}

Additionally, running gradle app_module_name_here:dependencies in your command line will print a list of dependencies. ./gradlew app:dependencies works if you have a Gradle wrapper. They are helpful for troubleshooting nimble Gradle configurations when various libraries are included in a single project. You can see the dependencies that specific libraries are bringing and where conflicts might be happening.

Add a map

Open the activity you’d like to add a map to and use the code below.

import android.os.Bundle
import androidx.appcompat.app.AppCompatActivity
import com.mapbox.maps.MapView
import com.mapbox.maps.Style
var mapView: MapView? = null
class MainActivity : AppCompatActivity() {
override fun onCreate(savedInstanceState: Bundle?) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState)
setContentView(R.layout.activity_main)
mapView = findViewById(R.id.mapView)
mapView?.getMapboxMap()?.loadStyleUri(Style.MAPBOX_STREETS)
}
}

Open the activity’s XML layout file and add the following:

<com.mapbox.maps.MapView xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
xmlns:mapbox="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res-auto"
android:id="@+id/mapView"
android:layout_width="match_parent"
android:layout_height="match_parent"
mapbox:mapbox_cameraTargetLat="40.7128"
mapbox:mapbox_cameraTargetLng="-74.0060"
mapbox:mapbox_cameraZoom="9.0"
/>

The MapView contains its own lifecycle methods for managing Android's OpenGL lifecycle, which must be called directly from the containing Activity. In order for your app to correctly call the MapView's lifecycle methods, you must override the following lifecycle methods in the Activity that contains the MapView and call the respective MapView method. The following lifecycle methods must be overridden and include the matching MapView method. If you're using a fragment, call mapview.onDestroy() inside the fragment's onDestroyView() method rather than inside onDestroy().

override fun onStart() {
super.onStart()
mapView?.onStart()
}
override fun onStop() {
super.onStop()
mapView?.onStop()
}
override fun onLowMemory() {
super.onLowMemory()
mapView?.onLowMemory()
}
override fun onDestroy() {
super.onDestroy()
mapView?.onDestroy()
}