How does Dart/Flutter get compiled to Android?

Sometimes you find the answer immediately after you ask it -_- Found this reddit answer

Both!

When developing, Flutter uses the VM so you can get nice things such hot reloading.But for production it compiles down (AOT) to a native ARM library then uses NDK on Android and LLVM on iOS to embed on native apps (runners).

That is why you get a debug/slow mode banner on the top-right corner, to remember you that, you are using the VM.

Check https://flutter.io/faq/#technology

Also https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FUxV4MIhS3g

P.S. This doesn't mean that Dart VM isn't suitable for production environments, you can still use it on server-side or long-running tasks, just like JVM, CRL, Node.js etc. I'm personally using it for a HTTP API and really enjoying it.

Dart is compiled to native machine code (ARM, Intel, ...) executable and bundled with some native platform code (Java, Kotlin, Objective-C/Swift) to interact with the native platform.

See also

How does Flutter run my code on Android? The engine’s C and C++ code

are compiled with Android’s NDK. The Dart code (both the SDK’s and yours) are ahead-of-time (AOT) compiled into a native, ARM library. That library is included in a “runner” Android project, and the whole thing is built into an APK. When launched, the app loads the Flutter library. Any rendering, input or event handling, and so on, are delegated to the compiled Flutter and app code. This is similar to the way many game engines work.

Debug mode builds use a virtual machine (VM) to run Dart code (hence the “debug” banner they show to remind people that they’re slightly slower) in order to enable stateful hot reload.

How does Flutter run my code on iOS? The engine’s C and C++ code are

compiled with LLVM. The Dart code (both the SDK’s and yours) are ahead-of-time (AOT) compiled into a native, ARM library. That library is included in a “runner” iOS project, and the whole thing is built into an .ipa. When launched, the app loads the Flutter library. Any rendering, input or event handling, and so on, are delegated to the compiled Flutter and app code. This is similar to the way many game engines work.

Debug mode builds use a virtual machine (VM) to run Dart code (hence the “debug” banner they show to remind people that they’re slightly slower) in order to enable stateful hot reload.

https://flutter.io/docs/resources/faq#how-does-flutter-run-my-code-on-android

See also https://proandroiddev.com/flutters-compilation-patterns-24e139d14177