Android EditText with Examples

In android, EditText is a user interface control which is used to allow the user to enter or modify the text. While using EditText control in our android applications, we need to specify the type of data the text field can accept using inputType attribute.

For example, if it accept plain text, then we need to specify the inputType as “text”. In case if EditText field is for password, then we need to specify the inputType as “textPassword”.

In android, EditText control is an extended version of TextView control with an additional features and it is used to allow users to enter input values.

In android, we can create EditText control in two ways either in XML layout file or create it in Activity file programmatically.

Create a EditText in Layout File

Following is the sample way to define EditText control in XML layout file in android application.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?><LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    android:orientation="vertical" >
    <EditText
        android:id="@+id/txtSub"
        android:layout_width="match_parent"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:hint="Subject"
        android:inputType="text"/>
</LinearLayout>

If you observe above code snippet, here we defined EditText control to accept plain text by using inpuType as “text” in xml layout file.

Create EditText Control in Activity File

In android, we can create EditText control programmatically in activity file to allow users to enter text based on our requirements. 

Following is the example of creating EditText control dynamically in activity file.

public class MainActivity extends AppCompatActivity {
    @Override
    protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
        setContentView(R.layout.activity_main);
        LinearLayout linearLayout =  (LinearLayout) findViewById(R.id.linearlayout);
        EditText et = new EditText(this);
        et.setHint("Subject");
        linearLayout.addView(et);
    }
}

Set the Text of Android EditText

In android, we can set the text of EditText control either while declaring it in Layout file or by using setText() method in Activity file.

Following is the example to set the text of TextView control while declaring it in XML Layout file.

<EditText
     android:id="@+id/editText1"
     android:layout_width="match_parent"
     android:layout_height="wrap_content"
     android:text="Welcome to Tutlane" />

If you observe above example we used android:text property to the set required text for EditText control in XML Layout file.

Following is another way to set the text of EditText control programmatically in activity file using setText() method.

EditText et = (EditText)findViewById(R.id.editText1);
et.setText("Welcome to Tutlane");

If you observe above code snippet, we are finding the EditText control which we defined in XML layout file using id property and setting the text using setText() method.

Get Text of Android EditText

In android, we can get the text of EditText control by using getText() method in Activity file.

Following is the example to get text of EditText control programmatically in activity file using getText() method.

public class MainActivity extends AppCompatActivity {
    @Override
    protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
        setContentView(R.layout.activity_main);
        EditText et = (EditText) findViewById(R.id.txtSub);
        String name = et.getText().toString();
    }
}

If you observe above code snippet, we are finding the EditText control which we defined in XML layout file using id property and getting the text of EditText control using getText() method.

Android EditText Attributes

Following are the some of commonly used attributes related to EditText control in android applications.

Attribute	Description
android:id	It is used to uniquely identify the control
android:gravity	It is used to specify how to align the text like left, right, center, top, etc.
android:text	It is used to set the text.
android:hint	It is used to display the hint text when text is empty
android:textColor	It is used to change the color of text.
android:textColorHint	It is used to change the text color of hint text.
android:textSize	It is used to specify the size of text.
android:textStyle	It is used to change the style (bold, italic, bolditalic) of text.
android:background	It is used to set the background color for edit text control
android:ems	It is used to make the textview be exactly this many ems wide.
android:width	It makes the TextView be exactly this many pixels wide.
android:height	It makes the TextView be exactly this many pixels tall.
android:maxWidth	It is used to make the TextView be at most this many pixels wide.
android:minWidth	It is used to make the TextView be at least this many pixels wide.
android:textAllCaps	It is used to present the text in all CAPS
android:typeface	It is used to specify the Typeface (normal, sans, serif, monospace) for the text.
android:textColorHighlight	It is used to change the color of text selection highlight.
android:inputType	It is used to specify the type of text being placed in a text fields.
android:fontFamily	It is used to specify the fontFamily for the text.
android:editable	If we set false, EditText won't allow us to enter or modify text

Android EditText Control Example

Following is the example of using multiple EditText controls with different inputTypes like password, phone, etc. in LinearLayout to build android application.

Create a new android application using android studio and give names as EditTextExample. In case if you are not aware of creating an app in android studio check this article Android Hello World App.

Now open an activity_main.xml file from \res\layout path and write the code like as shown below

activity_main.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?><LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    android:paddingLeft="40dp"
    android:orientation="vertical" android:id="@+id/linearlayout" >
    <EditText
        android:id="@+id/txtName"
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:layout_marginTop="25dp"
        android:ems="10"
        android:hint="Name"
        android:inputType="text"
        android:selectAllOnFocus="true" />
    <EditText
        android:id="@+id/txtPwd"
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:ems="10"
        android:hint="Password 0 to 9"
        android:inputType="numberPassword" />
    <EditText
        android:id="@+id/txtEmai"
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:ems="10"
        android:hint="Email"
        android:inputType="textEmailAddress" />
    <EditText
        android:id="@+id/txtDate"
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:layout_below="@+id/editText3"
        android:ems="10"
        android:hint="Date"
        android:inputType="date" />
    <EditText
        android:id="@+id/txtPhone"
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:ems="10"
        android:hint="Phone Number"
        android:inputType="phone"
        android:textColorHint="#FE8DAB"/>
    <Button
        android:id="@+id/btnSend"
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text="submit"
        android:textSize="16sp"
        android:textStyle="normal|bold" />
    <TextView
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:id="@+id/resultView"
        android:layout_marginTop="25dp"
        android:textSize="15dp"/>
</LinearLayout>

If you observe above code we created multiple EditText controls with different inputTypes, such as password, email address, date, phone number, plain text. 

Once we are done with creation of layout with required controls, we need to load the XML layout resource from our activity onCreate() callback method, for that open main activity file MainActivity.java from \java\com.tutlane.edittextexample path and write the code like as shown below.

MainActivity.java

package com.tutlane.edittextexample;import android.support.v7.app.AppCompatActivity;import android.os.Bundle;import android.view.View;import android.widget.Button;import android.widget.EditText;import android.widget.TextView;import org.w3c.dom.Text;
public class MainActivity extends AppCompatActivity {
    Button btnSubmit;
    EditText name, password, email, dob, phoneno;
    TextView result;
    @Override
    protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
        setContentView(R.layout.activity_main);
        name=(EditText)findViewById(R.id.txtName);
        password = (EditText)findViewById(R.id.txtPwd);
        email = (EditText)findViewById(R.id.txtEmai);
        dob = (EditText)findViewById(R.id.txtDate);
        phoneno= (EditText)findViewById(R.id.txtPhone);
        btnSubmit = (Button)findViewById(R.id.btnSend);
        result = (TextView)findViewById(R.id.resultView);
        btnSubmit.setOnClickListener(new View.OnClickListener() {
            @Override
            public void onClick(View v) {
                if (name.getText().toString().isEmpty() || password.getText().toString().isEmpty() || email.getText().toString().isEmpty() || dob.getText().toString().isEmpty()
                        || phoneno.getText().toString().isEmpty()) {
                    result.setText("Please Fill All the Details");
                } else {
                    result.setText("Name -  " + name.getText().toString() + " \n" + "Password -  " + password.getText().toString()
                            + " \n" + "E-Mail -  " + email.getText().toString() + " \n" + "DOB -  " + dob.getText().toString()
                            + " \n" + "Contact -  " + phoneno.getText().toString());
                }
            }
        });
    }
}

If you observe above code we are calling our layout using setContentView method in the form of R.layout.layout_file_name in our activity file. Here our xml file name is activity_main.xml so we used file name activity_main and we are getting the text of our EditText controls whenever we click on button.

Generally, during the launch of our activity, onCreate() callback method will be called by android framework to get the required layout for an activity.

Output of Android EditText Example

When we run above example using android virtual device (AVD) we will get a result like as shown below.

 If you observe above result, system displaying appropriate on-screen keyboard for each EditText control based on the defined inputType attribute and displayed a message if we click on button without entering a details in fields.

Once we enter details in all fields and click on Button we will get a result like as shown below.

This is how we can use EditText control in android applications to allow user to enter or modify the text based on our requirements.