Android Navigation Architecture Component: How to pass bundle data to startDestination

Answering my own question as I found the correct approach in the updated Navigation documentation.

At the time of writing this answer, I am using Navigation 2.2.0-alpha01

If you want to pass some data to the start destination directly as arguments from host activity, you need to manually set your host’s navigation graph inside the host activity’s onCreate() method, as shown below:

Get you navController:

val navController by lazy { findNavController(R.id.<your_nav_host_id>) }

Then in the host activity's onCreate()

val bundle = Bundle()
bundle.putString("some_argument", "some_value")
navController.setGraph(R.navigation.<you_nav_graph_xml>, bundle)

Or if you want to pass the whole intent extras as it is to the startDestination:

navController.setGraph(R.navigation.<you_nav_graph_xml>, intent.extras)

Since intent.extras would return a Bundle only

When you are setting the navGraph using setGraph() method, you should avoid setting the app:NavGraph attribute in the NavHostFragment definition, because doing so results in inflating and setting the navigation graph twice.

While reading these arguments in your startDestination fragment:

If you are using the Safe Args Plugin (which is very much recommended), then in your fragment:

private val args by navArgs<DummyFragmentArgs>()

Safe Args plugin would generate an Args class by appending Args to your fragment name. For example, if you fragment is called DummyFragment then Safe Args would generate a class called DummyFragmentArgs

where navArgs<> is an extension function defined in Android KTX

If you are not using Android KTX, you can get the args object like:

val args = DummyFragmentArgs.fromBundle(arguments!!)

Once you've acquired the arguments object, you can simply fetch your arguments:

args.someArgument

Notice how we passed "some_argument" as argument, and we are reading it as someArgument using Safe Args

If you are not using Safe Args (there is no reason to not use it though), you can access your arguments like this:

arguments?.getString("some_argument")

All of this is documented in Migrate to Navigation Component documentation here: https://developer.android.com/guide/navigation/navigation-migrate#pass_activity_destination_args_to_a_start_destination_fragment


i also came across same issue,

This is how i resolved it:

  1. Remove the the xml setup of NavHostFragment from your_activity.xml : i.e remove app:navGraph="@navigation/nav_graph

This is how your XML Should look like.

        <fragment
        android:id="@+id/nav_host"
        android:name="androidx.navigation.fragment.NavHostFragment"
        android:layout_width="match_parent"
        android:layout_height="match_parent"
        app:defaultNavHost="true"
        />
  1. Add Setup for NavHostFragment Programatically in onCreate() of activity. And pass bundle data using NavGraph.addDefaultArguments(bundleData) api

        override fun onCreate(savedInstanceState: Bundle?) {
            super.onCreate(savedInstanceState)
            setContentView(R.layout.editor_layout)
            setupNavigation()
        }
    
        private fun setupNavigation() {
            val navHostFragment = nav_host as NavHostFragment
            val navController = navHostFragment.navController
            val navInflater = navController.navInflater
            val graph = navInflater.inflate(R.navigation.nav_graph)
            graph.addDefaultArguments(intent!!.extras!!) // This is where you pass the bundle data from Activity to StartDestination 
            navHostFragment.navController.graph = graph
        }
    

UPDATE:

Dependencies in my Project Gradle file:

dependencies {

    def nav_version = "1.0.0-alpha08"

    implementation "android.arch.navigation:navigation-fragment:$nav_version" // use -ktx for Kotlin
    implementation "android.arch.navigation:navigation-ui:$nav_version" // use -ktx for Kotlin}
}

NOTE: In Navigation Component version 1.0.0-alpha09 for some reason google have no method as addDefaultArguments() might be fixed soon. But lower version's have addDefaultArguments() method.I have checked both in java and kotlin so try using 1.0.0-alpha07 or 1.0.0-alpha08


I found the solution after some research. It works with the latest Navigation library release. Refer the below code:

  1. Add this in your activity layout. Note: We are not setting app:navGraph argument in the xml file. We will set it dynamically.

    <fragment
        android:id="@+id/fragment"
        android:name="androidx.navigation.fragment.NavHostFragment"
        android:layout_width="match_parent"
        android:layout_height="0dp"
        android:layout_weight="1"
        app:defaultNavHost="true" />
    
  2. In your activity java file, write the below code and make changes accordingly. Use NavArgument to pass your argument value and add the argument to your custom Navgraph and then set graph.

    public class YourActivity extends AppCompatActivity {
         private NavArgument nameArg, mailArg;
    
         @Override
         protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
            super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
            setContentView(R.layout.profile);
            nameArg = new NavArgument.Builder().setDefaultValue("your name").build();
            mailArg = new NavArgument.Builder().setDefaultValue("your email id").build();
            NavController navController = Navigation.findNavController(this, R.id.fragment);
            NavInflater navInflater = navController.getNavInflater();
            NavGraph navGraph = navInflater.inflate(R.navigation.nav_profile_graph);
            navGraph.addArgument("your name key", nameArg);
            navGraph.addArgument("your mail key", mailArg);
            navController.setGraph(navGraph);
        }
    }
    
  3. Write the navigation graph below and add the same argument keys to the starting fragment.

    <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
    <navigation xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
       xmlns:app="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res-auto"
       xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
       android:id="@+id/nav_graph"
       app:startDestination="@+id/profile_basic">
    
       <fragment
          android:id="@+id/profile_basic"
          android:name="com.yourpackage.ProfileBasicFragment"
          android:label="Profile Basic"
          tools:layout="@layout/fragment_profile_basic">
    
          <argument android:name="your name key"
              app:argType="string"/>
    
          <argument android:name="your mail key"
              app:argType="string"/>
    
       </fragment>
    </navigation>
    
  4. In your fragment, just fetch the values using getArguments() function.

    String name = getArguments().getString("your name key");
    String mail = getArguments().getString("your mail key");