image_picker 0.8.2

Flutter plugin for selecting images from the Android and iOS image library, and taking new pictures with the camera.

Image Picker plugin for Flutter

A Flutter plugin for iOS and Android for picking images from the image library, and taking new pictures with the camera.

Installation

First, add image_picker as a dependency in your pubspec.yaml file.

iOS

Starting with version 0.8.1 the iOS implementation uses PHPicker to pick (multiple) images on iOS 14 or higher. As a result of implementing PHPicker it becomes impossible to pick HEIC images on the iOS simulator in iOS 14+. This is a known issue. Please test this on a real device, or test with non-HEIC images until Apple solves this issue.63426347 - Apple known issue

Add the following keys to your Info.plist file, located in <project root>/ios/Runner/Info.plist:

• NSPhotoLibraryUsageDescription - describe why your app needs permission for the photo library. This is called Privacy - Photo Library Usage Description in the visual editor.
• NSCameraUsageDescription - describe why your app needs access to the camera. This is called Privacy - Camera Usage Description in the visual editor.
• NSMicrophoneUsageDescription - describe why your app needs access to the microphone, if you intend to record videos. This is called Privacy - Microphone Usage Description in the visual editor.

Android

Starting with version 0.8.1 the Android implementation support to pick (multiple) images on Android 4.3 or higher.

No configuration required - the plugin should work out of the box.

It is no longer required to add android:requestLegacyExternalStorage="true" as an attribute to the <application> tag in AndroidManifest.xml, as image_picker has been updated to make use of scoped storage.

Note: Images and videos picked using the camera are saved to your application's local cache, and should therefore be expected to only be around temporarily. If you require your picked image to be stored permanently, it is your responsibility to move it to a more permanent location.

Example

import 'package:image_picker/image_picker.dart';

    ...
    final ImagePicker _picker = ImagePicker();
    // Pick an image
    final XFile? image = await _picker.pickImage(source: ImageSource.gallery);
    // Capture a photo
    final XFile? photo = await _picker.pickImage(source: ImageSource.camera);
    // Pick a video
    final XFile? image = await _picker.pickVideo(source: ImageSource.gallery);
    // Capture a video
    final XFile? photo = await _picker.pickVideo(source: ImageSource.camera);
    // Pick multiple images
    final List<XFile>? images = await _picker.pickMultiImage(source: ImageSource.gallery);
    // Pick multiple photos
    final List<XFile>? photos = await _picker.pickMultiImage(source: ImageSource.camera);
    ...

Handling MainActivity destruction on Android

Android system -- although very rarely -- sometimes kills the MainActivity after the image_picker finishes. When this happens, we lost the data selected from the image_picker. You can use retrieveLostData to retrieve the lost data in this situation. For example:

Future<void> getLostData() async {
  final LostDataResponse response =
      await picker.retrieveLostData();
  if (response.isEmpty) {
    return;
  }
  if (response.file != null) {
    setState(() {
      if (response.type == RetrieveType.video) {
        _handleVideo(response.file);
      } else {
        _handleImage(response.file);
      }
    });
  } else {
    _handleError(response.exception);
  }
}

There's no way to detect when this happens, so calling this method at the right place is essential. We recommend to wire this into some kind of start up check. Please refer to the example app to see how we used it.

On Android, retrieveLostData will only get the last picked image when picking multiple images, see: #84634.

Migrating to 0.8.2+

Starting with version 0.8.2 of the image_picker plugin, new methods have been added for picking files that return XFile instances (from the cross_file package) rather than the plugin's own PickedFile instances. While the previous methods still exist, it is already recommended to start migrating over to their new equivalents. Eventually, PickedFile and the methods that return instances of it will be deprecated and removed.

Call the new methods

Old API	New API
PickedFile image = await _picker.getImage(...)	XFile image = await _picker.pickImage(...)
List<PickedFile> images = await _picker.getMultiImage(...)	List<XFile> images = await _picker.pickMultiImage(...)
PickedFile video = await _picker.getVideo(...)	XFile video = await _picker.pickVideo(...)
LostData response = await _picker.getLostData()	LostDataResponse response = await _picker.retrieveLostData()