React native install linux

Setting up the development environment

This page will help you install and build your first React Native app.

If you are new to mobile development, the easiest way to get started is with Expo Go. Expo is a set of tools and services built around React Native and, while it has many features, the most relevant feature for us right now is that it can get you writing a React Native app within minutes. You will only need a recent version of Node.js and a phone or emulator. If you’d like to try out React Native directly in your web browser before installing any tools, you can try out Snack.

If you are already familiar with mobile development, you may want to use React Native CLI. It requires Xcode or Android Studio to get started. If you already have one of these tools installed, you should be able to get up and running within a few minutes. If they are not installed, you should expect to spend about an hour installing and configuring them.

Run the following command to create a new React Native project called «AwesomeProject»:

npx create-expo-app AwesomeProject  cd AwesomeProject npx expo start 

yarn create expo-app AwesomeProject  cd AwesomeProject yarn expo start 

This will start a development server for you.

Running your React Native application

Install the Expo Go app on your iOS or Android phone and connect to the same wireless network as your computer. On Android, use the Expo Go app to scan the QR code from your terminal to open your project. On iOS, use the built-in QR code scanner of the default iOS Camera app.

Modifying your app

Now that you have successfully run the app, let’s modify it. Open App.js in your text editor of choice and edit some lines. The application should reload automatically once you save your changes.

That’s it!

Congratulations! You’ve successfully run and modified your first React Native app.

Now what?

Expo also has docs you can reference if you have questions specific to the tool. You can also ask for help on the Expo Discord.

If you have a problem with Expo, before creating a new issue, please see if there’s an existing issue about it in the Expo issues.

If you’re curious to learn more about React Native, check out the Introduction to React Native.

Running your app on a simulator or virtual device

Expo Go allows you to run your React Native app on a physical device without installing iOS and Android native SDKs. If you want to run your app on the iOS Simulator or an Android Virtual Device, please refer to the instructions for «React Native CLI Quickstart» to learn how to install Xcode or set up your Android development environment.

Once you’ve set these up, you can launch your app on an Android Virtual Device by running npm run android , or on the iOS Simulator by running npm run ios (macOS only).

Caveats

The Expo Go app is a great tool to get started — it exists to help developers quickly get projects off the ground, to experiment with ideas (such as on Snack) and share their work with minimal friction. Expo Go makes this possible by including a feature-rich native runtime made up of every module in the Expo SDK, so all you need to do to use a module is install the package with npx expo install and reload your app.

The tradeoff is that the Expo Go app does not allow you to add custom native code — you can only use native modules built into the Expo SDK. There are many great libraries available outside of the Expo SDK, and you may even want to build your own native library. You can leverage these libraries with development builds, or by using «prebuild» to generate the native projects, or both. Learn more about adding native code to projects created with create-expo-app .

create-expo-app configures your project to use the most recent React Native version that is supported by the Expo SDK. The Expo Go app usually gains support for a given React Native version with new SDK versions (released quarterly). You can check this document to find out what versions are supported.

If you’re integrating React Native into an existing project, you can use the Expo SDK and development builds, but you will need to set up a native development environment. Select «React Native CLI Quickstart» above for instructions on configuring a native build environment for React Native.

Follow these instructions if you need to build native code in your project. For example, if you are integrating React Native into an existing application, or if you ran «prebuild» from Expo to generate your project’s native code, you’ll need this section.

The instructions are a bit different depending on your development operating system, and whether you want to start developing for iOS or Android. If you want to develop for both Android and iOS, that’s fine — you can pick one to start with, since the setup is a bit different.

Development OS​

Target OS​

Installing dependencies​

You will need Node, Watchman, the React Native command line interface, a JDK, and Android Studio.

While you can use any editor of your choice to develop your app, you will need to install Android Studio in order to set up the necessary tooling to build your React Native app for Android.

Node & Watchman

We recommend installing Node and Watchman using Homebrew. Run the following commands in a Terminal after installing Homebrew:

brew install node brew install watchman 

If you have already installed Node on your system, make sure it is Node 16 or newer.

Watchman is a tool by Facebook for watching changes in the filesystem. It is highly recommended you install it for better performance.

Java Development Kit

We recommend installing the OpenJDK distribution called Azul Zulu using Homebrew. Run the following commands in a Terminal after installing Homebrew:

brew tap homebrew/cask-versions brew install --cask zulu11  # Get path to where cask was installed to double-click installer brew info --cask zulu11 

After you install the JDK, update your JAVA_HOME environment variable. If you used above steps, JDK will likely be at /Library/Java/JavaVirtualMachines/zulu-11.jdk/Contents/Home

The Zulu OpenJDK distribution offers JDKs for both Intel and M1 Macs. This will make sure your builds are faster on M1 Macs compared to using an Intel-based JDK.

If you have already installed JDK on your system, we recommend JDK 11. You may encounter problems using higher JDK versions.

Android development environment

Setting up your development environment can be somewhat tedious if you’re new to Android development. If you’re already familiar with Android development, there are a few things you may need to configure. In either case, please make sure to carefully follow the next few steps.

1. Install Android Studio​

Download and install Android Studio. While on Android Studio installation wizard, make sure the boxes next to all of the following items are checked:

Then, click «Next» to install all of these components.

If the checkboxes are grayed out, you will have a chance to install these components later on.

Once setup has finalized and you’re presented with the Welcome screen, proceed to the next step.

2. Install the Android SDK​

Android Studio installs the latest Android SDK by default. Building a React Native app with native code, however, requires the Android 13 (Tiramisu) SDK in particular. Additional Android SDKs can be installed through the SDK Manager in Android Studio.

To do that, open Android Studio, click on «More Actions» button and select «SDK Manager».

The SDK Manager can also be found within the Android Studio «Preferences» dialog, under Appearance & Behavior → System Settings → Android SDK.

Select the «SDK Platforms» tab from within the SDK Manager, then check the box next to «Show Package Details» in the bottom right corner. Look for and expand the Android 13 (Tiramisu) entry, then make sure the following items are checked:

• Android SDK Platform 33
• Intel x86 Atom_64 System Image or Google APIs Intel x86 Atom System Image or (for Apple M1 Silicon) Google APIs ARM 64 v8a System Image

Next, select the «SDK Tools» tab and check the box next to «Show Package Details» here as well. Look for and expand the «Android SDK Build-Tools» entry, then make sure that 33.0.0 is selected.

Finally, click «Apply» to download and install the Android SDK and related build tools.

3. Configure the ANDROID_HOME environment variable

The React Native tools require some environment variables to be set up in order to build apps with native code.

Add the following lines to your ~/.zprofile or ~/.zshrc (if you are using bash , then ~/.bash_profile or ~/.bashrc ) config file:

export ANDROID_HOME=$HOME/Library/Android/sdk export PATH=$PATH:$ANDROID_HOME/emulator export PATH=$PATH:$ANDROID_HOME/platform-tools 

Run source ~/.zprofile (or source ~/.bash_profile for bash ) to load the config into your current shell. Verify that ANDROID_HOME has been set by running echo $ANDROID_HOME and the appropriate directories have been added to your path by running echo $PATH .

Please make sure you use the correct Android SDK path. You can find the actual location of the SDK in the Android Studio «Preferences» dialog, under Appearance & Behavior → System Settings → Android SDK.

React Native Command Line Interface

React Native has a built-in command line interface. Rather than install and manage a specific version of the CLI globally, we recommend you access the current version at runtime using npx , which ships with Node.js. With npx react-native , the current stable version of the CLI will be downloaded and executed at the time the command is run.

Creating a new application

If you previously installed a global react-native-cli package, please remove it as it may cause unexpected issues:

npm uninstall -g react-native-cli @react-native-community/cli 

React Native has a built-in command line interface, which you can use to generate a new project. You can access it without installing anything globally using npx , which ships with Node.js. Let’s create a new React Native project called «AwesomeProject»:

This is not necessary if you are integrating React Native into an existing application, if you «ejected» from Expo, or if you’re adding Android support to an existing React Native project (see Integration with Existing Apps). You can also use a third-party CLI to init your React Native app, such as Ignite CLI.

[Optional] Using a specific version or template

If you want to start a new project with a specific React Native version, you can use the —version argument:

npx [email protected] init AwesomeProject --version X.XX.X 

You can also start a project with a custom React Native template with the —template argument.

Preparing the Android device

You will need an Android device to run your React Native Android app. This can be either a physical Android device, or more commonly, you can use an Android Virtual Device which allows you to emulate an Android device on your computer.

Either way, you will need to prepare the device to run Android apps for development.

Using a physical device

If you have a physical Android device, you can use it for development in place of an AVD by plugging it in to your computer using a USB cable and following the instructions here.

Using a virtual device

If you use Android Studio to open ./AwesomeProject/android , you can see the list of available Android Virtual Devices (AVDs) by opening the «AVD Manager» from within Android Studio. Look for an icon that looks like this:

If you have recently installed Android Studio, you will likely need to create a new AVD. Select «Create Virtual Device. «, then pick any Phone from the list and click «Next», then select the Tiramisu API Level 33 image.

Click «Next» then «Finish» to create your AVD. At this point you should be able to click on the green triangle button next to your AVD to launch it, then proceed to the next step.

Running your React Native application

Step 1: Start Metro

Metro is the JavaScript build tool for React Native. To start the Metro development server, run the following from your project folder:

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