Manage availability for on-demand Google Play services modules

  • Some Google Play services SDK functionalities are provided as on-demand modules to conserve device storage and memory.

  • While Google Play services usually handles module installation automatically, the ModuleInstallClient API allows for more control over this process.

  • ModuleInstallClient enables checking module availability, requesting installations (deferred or urgent), monitoring progress, and handling errors.

  • You can simulate module install API results for testing purposes using the FakeModuleInstallClient in conjunction with a dependency injection framework like Hilt.

As described in the Overview of Google Play services article, SDKs powered by Google Play services are backed by on-device services on Google-certified Android devices. To conserve storage and memory across the entire fleet of devices, some services are provided as modules that are installed on-demand when your app requires the relevant functionality. For example, ML Kit provides this option when using models in Google Play services.

In most cases, the Google Play services SDK downloads and installs the necessary modules automatically when your app uses an API that requires them. However, you might want to have more control over the process, such as when you want to improve the user experience by installing the module in advance.

The ModuleInstallClient API gives you the ability to:

  • Check if the modules are already installed on the device.
  • Request to install the modules.
  • Monitor the installation progress.
  • Handle errors during the installation process.

This guide shows you how to use ModuleInstallClient to manage modules in your app. Note that the following code snippets use the TensorFlow Lite SDK (play-services-tflite-java) as an example, but these steps are applicable for any library that's integrated with OptionalModuleApi.

Before you begin

To prepare your app, complete the steps in the following sections.

App prerequisites

Make sure that your app's build file uses the following values:

  • A minSdkVersion of 23 or higher

Configure your app

  1. In your top-level settings.gradle file, include Google's Maven repository and the Maven central repository within the dependencyResolutionManagement block:

    dependencyResolutionManagement {
    repositories {
        google()
        mavenCentral()
    }
}

  2. In your module's Gradle build file (usually app/build.gradle), add the Google Play services dependencies for play-services-base and play-services-tflite-java:

    dependencies