With Jetpack Compose entering beta today, the Android team is encouraging developers to learn about and “get ready to adopt” the modern toolkit for building native UI. To do so, Google is launching a monthlong Android Dev Challenge that includes Jetpack Compose-themed prizes.
Update 5/12: Google received 2,000 Android Dev Challenge submissions, and today named the seven Pixel 5 winners for the final two rounds. A fun video shows off the various app designs built with Jetpack Compose.
Google will offer four weekly challenges that familiarize developers with the Compose mental model and different APIs. Upcoming topics will cover animations, Material Theming, composables, and lists.
Last year’s challenge focused on machine learning, and the winning Android developers got the opportunity to consult Googlers and Play Store promotion. For this round, Google touts over 1,000 prizes in the coming weeks.
Every Wednesday, a blog post will detail requirements, with solutions needing to be implemented in a GitHub repository. A template with instructions in the README file is available here.
Week 4 | Jetpack Compose Android Dev Challenge
For the final round, Google is looking for your “A game” in the form of a “single-screen weather forecast app.” Developers have until March 23rd, 23:59 PST to submit an entry with four rating criteria:
- Visual beauty
- Novelty of idea
- Code quality
- Overall execution (including accessibility)
The winner of each category will get a Pixel 5, while a fifth Made by Google flagship will be awarded to the “best of the best submission.”
To help implement a beautiful design, check out the Compose documentation on layouts, theming, and graphics. Think of novel uses of animations and gestures. Improve your code quality with architecture and testing. And for overall execution, make sure to read about accessibility.
Week 3
The third task is focused on speed and sees you compete with other Android developers in your time zone. On March 13th, you’ll be asked to implement a set of designs provided by Google and then quickly submit. The requirements will be posted here on Saturday.
- APAC-friendly: opens at 9AM UTC+8
- EMEA-friendly: opens at 9AM UTC
- Americas-friendly: opens at 9AM UTC-8
For this week’s challenge, we’re giving away a Google Pixel 5, the ultimate 5G Google phone. In fact, we’ll be giving away three Google Pixel 5 phones: one to each developer who is fastest to submit a successfully implemented design for each of the three rounds of challenges.*
Week 2
The second challenge tasks you with creating a “working, single screen countdown timer” where, again, the “UI must be fully built in Compose” by 11:59 p.m. PT on March 9th.
The first 500 people to successfully complete this challenge will receive a Jetpack Compose poster and a set of Android pencils, your own stress relieving coloring experience. Plus, you’ll get a limited edition Jetpack Compose comic strip poster, charting how Team Jetpack saves the galaxy from bad UI.
Week 1
The first challenge starts today and submissions must be received by March 2 at 11:59 p.m. PT. It involves building a mock puppy adoption app with an “overview screen that displays a list of puppies, and a detail screen showing each puppy’s details.”
Your UI must be fully built in Compose. Your submission will only be judged based on your app’s UI layer. To help you with the implementation, check out the Compose documentation on layouts, lists, text and navigation. For some paws-on learning try out the Compose pathway, with codelabs covering several topics useful in completing this challenge.
For this week, the first 500 people to finish will get a Lego Jetpack Compose superhero trophy. One of the upcoming prizes will be a Pixel 5, with Google noting how a “similarly valued electronics gift card for winners that reside in a country where a Google Pixel 5 is unavailable.”
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