How do I connect an Android phone to Visual Studio Code?

Question

VSCode shows 'No Device' in the status bar, while Android Studio has no problems connecting to device over usb, or creating a virtual device.

When I run flutter doctor in VSCode terminal, I get:

flutter doctor message

When I click the 'No Device' (as a shortcut to Flutter: Launch Emulator), I get the error message

avdmanager is missing from the Android SDK

I've tried:

• updating my PATH variables - I was a bit confused as to which folder I should point to, so I tried every single one I found mention of:

1. C:\Users\USERNAME\AppData\Local\Android\Sdk;
2. C:\Flutter\flutter\bin;
3. C:\Flutter\flutter\bin\cache\dart-sdk\bin;

• updating "dart.flutterSdkPath" in VSCode
• specifying ADB location --> C:/Users/USERNAME/AppData/Local/Android/Sdk/platform-tools/adb.exe
• uninstalling and reinstalling Android Studio
• deleting, downloading, and re-unzipping Android/Sdk/platform-tools

And nothing makes any change.

Solution

Here is one of the workaround:

Open Android Studio then click on SDK Manager (down-pointing arrow)

This should open a new box with your Android SDK Location at the top. It should look like this:

/Users/username/Library/Android/sdk

Configure the path of android-sdk

flutter config --android-sdk /Users/username/Library/Android/sdk

Add android-license to Flutter

flutter doctor --android-licenses

Then, you can run flutter doctor to verify,

Comments

[CoderUni]

"avdmanager is missing from the Android SDK" your problem is with android sdk. try uninstalling and resinstlling it. You should also download the avd in android studio

[secret]

May you try Genymotion?

[Vinamra Jaiswal]

recheck if usb debugging has been enabled or not?

[Logan Blackisle]

@VinamraJaiswal USB debugging has been enabled - no change (VSCode refuses to see any devices regardless if that device is an actual connected device, or an emulated one through Android Studio).

[Logan Blackisle]

@Uni I already tried deleting, downloading, and re-unzipping Android/Sdk/platform-tools, shouldn't that take care of it if that was the problem?

[GrahamD]

Maybe this answer can help? stackoverflow.com/questions/49115840/…

[Muhammad Qasim]

I've done all this and Flutter cli can detect android devices/emulators but not the VS Code extension :( It just keep giving error avdmanager is missing from the Android SDK