How to list Third-Party Dependencies Licenses in your Android app

Last updated on: May 27, 2023

In this tutorial, I’m going to show you how to implement a method that shows the licenses of the third-party dependencies automatically, using the OSS Licenses plugin made by Google.

Adding the OSS Licenses plugin

Go to the root-level build.gradle of your project and add the following line inside the dependencies { … }

buildscript {
    
    // ...

    dependencies {
        // ...

        classpath 'com.google.android.gms:oss-licenses-plugin:0.10.5'
    }
}

// ...Code language: Kotlin (kotlin)

Next, go to the app-level build.gradle of your app, add the following library, and apply the plugin at the bottom:

dependencies {
    // ...

    implementation 'com.google.android.gms:play-services-oss-licenses:17.0.0'
    
    // ...
}

apply plugin: 'com.google.android.gms.oss-licenses-plugin'Code language: Kotlin (kotlin)

Showing dependencies licenses

You can show the licenses of your dependencies by calling the following line inside a listener.

// ...

license_btn.setOnClickListener {
    startActivity(Intent(this, OssLicensesMenuActivity::class.java))
}

// ...Code language: Kotlin (kotlin)

Customizing the OSS Licenses Activity

Changing Title

Change the title of the OSS Licenses Menu Activity by adding the following line before you call the activity:

license_btn.setOnClickListener {
    OssLicensesMenuActivity.setActivityTitle("Third-Party Licenses")
    // ...
}Code language: Swift (swift)

Changing Theme

Use a different theme for OSS Licenses Menu Activity and OSS Licenses Activity by adding the following in your AndroidManifestl.xml (manifests > AndroidManifest.xml)

<activity
    android:name="com.google.android.gms.oss.licenses.OssLicensesMenuActivity"
    android:theme="@style/MyCustomTheme" />

<activity
    android:name="com.google.android.gms.oss.licenses.OssLicensesActivity"
    android:theme="@style/MyCustomTheme" />Code language: HTML, XML (xml)

You can find the final project here

If you have any questions, please feel free to leave a comment below