Html.fromHtml deprecated in Android N

Question

I am using Html.fromHtml to view html in a TextView.

Spanned result = Html.fromHtml(mNews.getTitle());
...
...
mNewsTitle.setText(result);

But Html.fromHtml is now deprecated in Android N+

What/How do I find the new way of doing this?

Solution 1

update: as @Andy mentioned below Google has created HtmlCompat which can be used instead of the method below. Add this dependency implementation 'androidx.core:core:1.0.1 to the build.gradle file of your app. Make sure you use the latest version of androidx.core:core.

This allows you to use:

HtmlCompat.fromHtml(html, HtmlCompat.FROM_HTML_MODE_LEGACY);

You can read more about the different flags on the HtmlCompat-documentation

original answer: In Android N they introduced a new Html.fromHtml method. Html.fromHtml now requires an additional parameter, named flags. This flag gives you more control about how your HTML gets displayed.

On Android N and above you should use this new method. The older method is deprecated and may be removed in the future Android versions.

You can create your own Util-method which will use the old method on older versions and the newer method on Android N and above. If you don't add a version check your app will break on lower Android versions. You can use this method in your Util class.

@SuppressWarnings("deprecation")
public static Spanned fromHtml(String html){
    if(html == null){
        // return an empty spannable if the html is null
        return new SpannableString("");
    }else if (Build.VERSION.SDK_INT >= Build.VERSION_CODES.N) {
        // FROM_HTML_MODE_LEGACY is the behaviour that was used for versions below android N
        // we are using this flag to give a consistent behaviour
        return Html.fromHtml(html, Html.FROM_HTML_MODE_LEGACY);
    } else {
        return Html.fromHtml(html);
    }
}

You can convert the HTML.FROM_HTML_MODE_LEGACY into an additional parameter if you want. This gives you more control about it which flag to use.

You can read more about the different flags on the Html class documentation

Solution 2

I had a lot of these warnings and I always use FROM_HTML_MODE_LEGACY so I made a helper class called HtmlCompat containing the following:

   @SuppressWarnings("deprecation")
   public static Spanned fromHtml(String source) {
        if (Build.VERSION.SDK_INT >= Build.VERSION_CODES.N) {
            return Html.fromHtml(source, Html.FROM_HTML_MODE_LEGACY);
        } else {
            return Html.fromHtml(source);
        }
    }

Solution 3

Compare of the flags of fromHtml().

<p style="color: blue;">This is a paragraph with a style</p>

<h4>Heading H4</h4>

<ul>
   <li style="color: yellow;">
      <font color=\'#FF8000\'>li orange element</font>
   </li>
   <li>li #2 element</li>
</ul>

<blockquote>This is a blockquote</blockquote>

Text after blockquote
Text before div

<div>This is a div</div>

Text after div

Solution 4

Or you can use androidx.core.text.HtmlCompat:

HtmlCompat.fromHtml("<b>HTML</b>", HtmlCompat.FROM_HTML_MODE_LEGACY)

HtmlCompat docs

Solution 5

If you are lucky enough to develop on Kotlin, just create an extension function:

fun String.toSpanned(): Spanned {
    if (Build.VERSION.SDK_INT >= Build.VERSION_CODES.N) {
        return Html.fromHtml(this, Html.FROM_HTML_MODE_LEGACY)
    } else {
        @Suppress("DEPRECATION")
        return Html.fromHtml(this)
    }
}

And then it's so sweet to use it everywhere:

yourTextView.text = anyString.toSpanned()

View more solutions

Comments

[ban-geoengineering]

Which flag does the zero represent?

[ban-geoengineering]

Html.FROM_HTML_MODE_LEGACY

[vanomart]

ah, waiting for something like HtmlCompat to appear

[Ted Hopp]

It's also useful to add a //noinspection deprecation comment just under the else to avoid lint warnings.

[Yair Kukielka]

You can see what each of these flags do in this blog post: medium.com/@yair.kukielka/…

[Stoycho Andreev]

Same effect like the accepted answer, but +1 because of SuppressWarnings annotation

[Kalpesh Patel]

Can you please share input HTML also? This would help in better understanding the conversion.

[Ranjithkumar]

Can you give small explanation about this mode?

[Ranjithkumar]

Can you give small explanation about this mode?

[Christine]

I see that the style attributes are not implemented, is there a way to implement them?

[flo1411]

And this seems to be deprecated as well and can be replaced by Html.FromHtml(htmlText, Android.Text.FromHtmlOptions.ModeLegacy);

[JJD]

When I use your library on an app which uses minSdkVersion 15 and targetSdkVersion 23 I get a build error for values-v24.xml: Error:(3) Error retrieving parent for item: No resource found that matches the given name 'android:TextAppearance.Material.Widget.Button.Borderless.Co‌​lored'. Your library targets API level 25, obviously. How can still I use it?

[Minami]

you may save typings by remove Spanned and return

[android developer]

Why is it deprecated? What's better to use now? Why the need for the function you wrote, if the code behind the deprecated functions already use this flag?

[shareef]

could you provide all HtmlCompact may be on git hub it looks cool

[Wajid]

if you want SDK to handle version checks, use: HtmlCompat.fromHtml("textWithHtmlTags", HtmlCompat.FROM_HTML_MODE_LEGACY)

[k2col]

@shareef I would but it's really just a boring utility class with this single method in it....

[Leonardo Sibela]

For me @SuppressWarnings("deprecation") did not work. I used @Suppress("deprecation") instead.

[xjcl]

@vanomart Aaaand HtmlCompat including HtmlCompat.fromHtml is a thing now =)

[CDrosos]

you can use this even on Android 5?

[Ondřej Z]

@CDrosos yes, it is part of support library

[Amir Dora.]

you don't need to add the else part, fromHtml method handles it by default for lower api devices

[James]

You can replace the if/else with: HtmlCompat.fromHtml(text, HtmlCompat.FROM_HTML_MODE_LEGACY)

[Ali Kazi]

You can also just use HtmlCompat and avoid checking Android version.

[user924]

why not FROM_HTML_MODE_COMPACT?