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This library is not available in the Expo Go app — use development builds to try it out.

expo-widgets enables the creation of iOS home screen widgets and Live Activities using Expo UI components, without writing native code. It provides a simple API for creating and updating a widget's timeline, as well as starting and managing Live Activities. You can build the layout using expo/ui components and modifiers.

Known limitations

• Frequent Live Activity updates. To raise the budget for frequent push updates, set NSSupportsLiveActivitiesFrequentUpdates to true in your Info.plist. The system may still throttle updates, and the user can disable frequent updates in Settings.
• Widget runtime. Code inside a 'widget'-marked component runs in an isolated runtime and can only use @expo/ui/swift-ui components, with no React hooks, app state, or asynchronous work. See The 'widget' directive.

Installation

If you are installing this in an existing React Native app, make sure to install expo in your project.

Configuration in app config

You can configure expo-widgets using its built-in config plugin if you use config plugins in your project (Continuous Native Generation (CNG)). The plugin allows you to configure various properties that cannot be set at runtime and require building a new app binary to take effect.

Example app.json with config plugin

{
  "expo": {
    "plugins": [
      [
        "expo-widgets",
        {
          "widgets": [
            {
              "name": "MyWidget",
              "displayName": "My Widget",
              "description": "A sample home screen widget",
              "ios": {
                "supportedFamilies": ["systemSmall", "systemMedium", "systemLarge"]
              }
            }
          ]
        }
      ]
    ]
  }
}

Configurable properties

The top-level supportedFamilies and contentMarginsDisabled options are deprecated aliases for ios.supportedFamilies and ios.contentMarginsDisabled. Prefer the nested ios form shown above.

Full example with all options

{
  "expo": {
    "plugins": [
      [
        "expo-widgets",
        {
          "bundleIdentifier": "com.example.myapp.widgets",
          "groupIdentifier": "group.com.example.myapp",
          "enablePushNotifications": true,
          "widgets": [
            {
              "name": "StatusWidget",
              "displayName": "Status",
              "description": "Shows your current status at a glance",
              "ios": {
                "contentMarginsDisabled": true,
                "supportedFamilies": ["systemSmall", "systemMedium"]
              }
            },
            {
              "name": "WeatherWidget",
              "displayName": "Weather",
              "description": "Shows the weather for a city you choose",
              "ios": {
                "supportedFamilies": ["systemSmall", "systemMedium"],
                "configuration": {
                  "title": "Choose a city",
                  "description": "Pick which city to show the weather for",
                  "parameters": {
                    "city": {
                      "title": "City",
                      "type": "enum",
                      "default": "sf",
                      "values": [
                        { "name": "San Francisco", "value": "sf" },
                        { "name": "New York", "value": "nyc" }
                      ]
                    }
                  }
                }
              }
            },
            {
              "name": "LockScreenWidget",
              "displayName": "Quick View",
              "description": "View info on your Lock Screen",
              "ios": {
                "supportedFamilies": [
                  "accessoryCircular",
                  "accessoryRectangular",
                  "accessoryInline"
                ]
              }
            }
          ]
        }
      ]
    ]
  }
}

Usage

The 'widget' directive

Components passed to createWidget and createLiveActivity must start with the 'widget' directive. The directive tells the bundler to compile that component into a separate JavaScript bundle that runs in an isolated runtime inside the widget extension, not in your app's React Native runtime.

Because of this isolation, code inside a 'widget'-marked component is limited:

• It can only render @expo/ui/swift-ui components and modifiers. Standard React Native components (such as View and Text from react-native) are not available.
• It cannot use React hooks (useState, useEffect, and others), component state, or context. The function must be pure and return its layout synchronously.
• It cannot perform asynchronous work, import other modules, or access your app's runtime or in-memory state.
• It cannot reference anything declared outside the component function, including plain top-level consts in the same file. The bundler serializes only the function body, so module-scope values are not present at runtime. Declare every constant and helper inside the widget function, or pass it in through props.

All data a widget needs must come in through its props (set with updateSnapshot, updateTimeline, or a Live Activity's start and update) and the environment argument. To use images, write them to widgetsDirectory from your app and reference them by path.

import { Text } from '@expo/ui/swift-ui';
import { createWidget, type WidgetEnvironment } from 'expo-widgets';

// Declared at module scope — not included in the widget bundle.
const CITY_NAMES: Record<string, string> = { sf: 'San Francisco' };

const CityWidget = (props: object, environment: WidgetEnvironment<{ city: string }>) => {
  'widget';
  // Throws at runtime: Can't find variable: CITY_NAMES
  return <Text>{CITY_NAMES[environment.configuration.city]}</Text>;
};

export default createWidget('CityWidget', CityWidget);

Move CITY_NAMES inside CityWidget (or pass the resolved value through props) to fix it.

Widgets

Prerequisite: Creating a widget

Start by creating a widget using the createWidget function and pass the widget component marked with the 'widget' directive. The component receives your widget props as the first argument and a WidgetEnvironment object as the second.

import { Text, VStack } from '@expo/ui/swift-ui';
import { font, foregroundStyle } from '@expo/ui/swift-ui/modifiers';
import { createWidget, type WidgetEnvironment } from 'expo-widgets';

type MyWidgetProps = {
  count: number;
};

const MyWidget = (props: MyWidgetProps, environment: WidgetEnvironment) => {
  'widget';
  return (
    <VStack>
      <Text modifiers={[font({ weight: 'bold', size: 16 }), foregroundStyle('#000000')]}>
        Count: {props.count}
      </Text>
      <Text>Family: {environment.widgetFamily}</Text>
    </VStack>
  );
};

export default createWidget('MyWidget', MyWidget);

The widget name ('MyWidget') must match the name field in your widget configuration in the app config.

Basic widget

An effective way to update a widget is to use the updateSnapshot method. This creates a widget timeline with a single entry that displays immediately.

The example below continues from Creating a widget.

import MyWidget from './MyWidget';

// Update the widget
MyWidget.updateSnapshot({ count: 5 });

Timeline widget

Use the updateTimeline method to schedule widget updates at a specific time. The system automatically updates the widget based on the timeline.

The example below continues from Creating a widget.

import MyWidget from './MyWidget';

MyWidget.updateTimeline([
  { date: new Date(), props: { count: 1 } },
  { date: new Date(Date.now() + 3600000), props: { count: 2 } }, // 1 hour from now
  { date: new Date(Date.now() + 7200000), props: { count: 3 } }, // 2 hours from now
  { date: new Date(Date.now() + 10800000), props: { count: 4 } }, // 3 hours from now
]);

Reading the current timeline

Use getTimeline to read the entries currently scheduled for a widget, including past and future entries.

import MyWidget from './MyWidget';

const entries = await MyWidget.getTimeline();
// [{ date: Date, props: { count: number } }, ...]

Reloading a widget

Use reload to force the system to refresh a widget's content and timeline immediately, for example after the underlying data changes.

import MyWidget from './MyWidget';

MyWidget.reload();

Responsive widget

Use the environment argument to adapt the layout to the current widget size and rendering context.

import { HStack, Text, VStack } from '@expo/ui/swift-ui';
import { createWidget, type WidgetEnvironment } from 'expo-widgets';

type WeatherWidgetProps = {
  temperature: number;
  condition: string;
};

const WeatherWidget = (props: WeatherWidgetProps, environment: WidgetEnvironment) => {
  'widget';
  // Render different layouts based on size
  if (environment.widgetFamily === 'systemSmall') {
    return (
      <VStack>
        <Text>{props.temperature}°</Text>
      </VStack>
    );
  }

  if (environment.widgetFamily === 'systemMedium') {
    return (
      <HStack>
        <Text>{props.temperature}°</Text>
        <Text>{props.condition}</Text>
      </HStack>
    );
  }

  // systemLarge and others
  return (
    <VStack>
      <Text>Temperature: {props.temperature}°</Text>
      <Text>Condition: {props.condition}</Text>
      <Text>Updated: {environment.date.toLocaleTimeString()}</Text>
    </VStack>
  );
};

const Widget = createWidget('WeatherWidget', WeatherWidget);
export default Widget;

Widget.updateSnapshot({
  temperature: 72,
  condition: 'Sunny',
});

Adapting to the rendering environment

Beyond widgetFamily and date, the environment object describes how and where the system is drawing the widget so you can adapt the layout:

• colorScheme: 'light' or 'dark'.
• widgetRenderingMode: 'fullColor' for home screen widgets, 'vibrant' for Lock Screen widgets (the system desaturates them into an adaptive monochrome look), and 'accented' for tinted widgets on iOS 18 and later. Use this to choose colors that read well in each mode.
• isLuminanceReduced: true when the display requires reduced brightness (such as Always-On). Lower the overall brightness of your content, for example by using stroked rather than filled shapes.
• widgetContentMargins: The system-suggested margins (top, bottom, leading, trailing) when content margins are not disabled.
• showsWidgetLabel: For accessory widgets, whether an accessory label can be displayed.

Interactive widgets

Widgets can include interactive controls such as Button. The value a button's onPress callback returns becomes the widget's new props. The runtime persists it and reloads the widget on device, with no running app process required. This is the primary way to make a widget update itself in response to a tap. Interactive widgets require iOS 17 or later.

import { Button, Text, VStack } from '@expo/ui/swift-ui';
import { createWidget } from 'expo-widgets';

type CounterProps = {
  count: number;
};

const CounterWidget = (props: CounterProps) => {
  'widget';
  return (
    <VStack>
      <Text>Count: {props.count}</Text>
      <Button label="Increment" target="increment" onPress={() => ({ count: props.count + 1 })} />
    </VStack>
  );
};

export default createWidget('CounterWidget', CounterWidget);

To also keep your running app in sync with widget interactions, give the control a target identifier (as above) and listen for taps with addUserInteractionListener. The listener receives the widget's name as source and the control's target. Unlike onPress, it only fires while the app process is alive, so use it to mirror interactions into app state, not as the widget's update mechanism.

import { addUserInteractionListener } from 'expo-widgets';

const subscription = addUserInteractionListener(event => {
  if (event.source === 'CounterWidget' && event.target === 'increment') {
    // The widget already updated itself via onPress; mirror the change in app state here.
    console.log('Counter incremented from the widget');
  }
});

// Later, when you no longer need updates:
subscription.remove();

Sharing images with widgetsDirectory

A widget can't access files inside your app's sandbox, so to display an image in a widget you must place it in the shared app group container. widgetsDirectory is a file:// URL string pointing to a directory that both your app and its widgets can read. Write the image there from your app, then reference it by path in the widget.

import { widgetsDirectory } from 'expo-widgets';

// `widgetsDirectory` is a file:// URL to a directory shared with your widgets.
console.log(widgetsDirectory);

widgetsDirectory is null only when no app group is configured. The groupIdentifier config plugin option sets one up automatically (falling back to group.<bundle identifier>), so it is available in normal use.

Configurable widgets

When you add an ios.configuration to a widget, users can long-press the widget and edit its parameters. The values they choose are delivered to your widget through environment.configuration. Type the configuration by passing a second type argument to createWidget (and WidgetEnvironment). Configurable widgets require iOS 17 or later.

import { Text, VStack } from '@expo/ui/swift-ui';
import { createWidget, type WidgetEnvironment } from 'expo-widgets';

type WeatherProps = {
  temperature: number;
};

type WeatherConfiguration = {
  city: string;
};

const WeatherWidget = (
  props: WeatherProps,
  environment: WidgetEnvironment<WeatherConfiguration>
) => {
  'widget';
  return (
    <VStack>
      <Text>{environment.configuration.city}</Text>
      <Text>{props.temperature}°</Text>
    </VStack>
  );
};

export default createWidget<WeatherProps, WeatherConfiguration>('WeatherWidget', WeatherWidget);

Live Activities

Live Activities display real-time information on the Lock Screen and in the Dynamic Island on supported devices.

Prerequisite: Creating a Live Activity

Live Activity layouts must be created once using createLiveActivity and marked with the 'widget' directive. The component receives your props as the first argument and a LiveActivityEnvironment object as the second. It returns an object describing the layout for each presentation: the Lock Screen banner, the compact and minimal Dynamic Island states, and the expanded Dynamic Island regions.

createLiveActivity registers a Live Activity entirely at runtime, and the library's built-in Live Activity target renders it. Do not add a widgets[] entry for it in the app config. The widgets[] array is only for home screen and Lock Screen widgets, and an entry without supportedFamilies generates an invalid widget target that fails to build. The name you pass to createLiveActivity only has to match this createLiveActivity call, not an app-config widget.

import { Image, Text, VStack } from '@expo/ui/swift-ui';
import { font, foregroundStyle, padding } from '@expo/ui/swift-ui/modifiers';
import { createLiveActivity, type LiveActivityEnvironment } from 'expo-widgets';

type DeliveryActivityProps = {
  etaMinutes: number;
  status: string;
};

const DeliveryActivity = (props: DeliveryActivityProps, environment: LiveActivityEnvironment) => {
  'widget';
  const accentColor = environment.isLuminanceReduced ? '#FFFFFF' : '#007AFF';

  return {
    banner: (
      <VStack modifiers={[padding({ all: 12 })]}>
        <Text modifiers={[font({ weight: 'bold' }), foregroundStyle(accentColor)]}>
          {props.status}
        </Text>
        <Text>Estimated arrival: {props.etaMinutes} minutes</Text>
      </VStack>
    ),
    compactLeading: <Image systemName="box.truck.fill" color={accentColor} />,
    compactTrailing: <Text>{props.etaMinutes} min</Text>,
    minimal: <Image systemName="box.truck.fill" color={accentColor} />,
    expandedLeading: (
      <VStack modifiers={[padding({ all: 12 })]}>
        <Image systemName="box.truck.fill" color={accentColor} />
        <Text modifiers={[font({ size: 12 })]}>Delivering</Text>
      </VStack>
    ),
    expandedTrailing: (
      <VStack modifiers={[padding({ all: 12 })]}>
        <Text modifiers={[font({ weight: 'bold', size: 20 })]}>{props.etaMinutes}</Text>
        <Text modifiers={[font({ size: 12 })]}>minutes</Text>
      </VStack>
    ),
    expandedBottom: (
      <VStack modifiers={[padding({ all: 12 })]}>
        <Text>Driver: John Smith</Text>
        <Text>Order #12345</Text>
      </VStack>
    ),
  };
};

export default createLiveActivity('DeliveryActivity', DeliveryActivity);

The layout object supports these regions:

• banner: The main Lock Screen presentation.
• bannerSmall: A compact Lock Screen presentation used on CarPlay and watchOS. Falls back to banner when omitted.
• compactLeading, compactTrailing, minimal: The compact and minimal Dynamic Island states.
• expandedLeading, expandedTrailing, expandedCenter, expandedBottom: The regions of the expanded Dynamic Island.

The environment object also exposes isLuminanceReduced, isActivityFullscreen, isActivityUpdateReduced, and activityFamily so you can adapt the layout to the current presentation.

Starting a Live Activity

The example below continues from Creating a Live Activity.

import { Button, View } from 'react-native';
import DeliveryActivity from './DeliveryActivity';

function App() {
  const startDeliveryTracking = () => {
    // Start the Live Activity
    const instance = DeliveryActivity.start(
      {
        etaMinutes: 15,
        status: 'Your delivery is on the way',
      },
      'myapp://deliveries/12345'
    );
    // Store instance
  };

  return (
    <View style={{ flex: 1, justifyContent: 'center', alignItems: 'center' }}>
      <Button title="Start Delivery Tracking" onPress={startDeliveryTracking} />
    </View>
  );
}
export default App;

The optional second argument is a URL associated with the Live Activity. When the user taps the activity, the system opens your app with that URL, so you can route to the relevant screen using linking (for example with Expo Router's deep linking).

Updating a Live Activity

The example below continues from Starting a Live Activity.

import { LiveActivity } from 'expo-widgets';

function updateDelivery(instance: LiveActivity<DeliveryActivityProps>) {
  instance.update({
    etaMinutes: 2,
    status: 'Delivery arriving soon!',
  });
}

Recovering active Live Activities

A Live Activity can outlive the app process that started it. Use getInstances on the factory to retrieve the activities of that type that are currently active, for example to update or end them after your app relaunches.

import DeliveryActivity from './DeliveryActivity';

const activeInstances = DeliveryActivity.getInstances();

for (const instance of activeInstances) {
  await instance.update({ etaMinutes: 5, status: 'Almost there' });
}

Ending a Live Activity

Use end to finish a Live Activity. You can choose the dismissal policy, optionally provide a final content state, and pass a contentDate so the system can ignore stale updates.

import { after, type LiveActivity } from 'expo-widgets';

async function completeDelivery(instance: LiveActivity<DeliveryActivityProps>) {
  await instance.end(
    after(new Date(Date.now() + 15 * 60 * 1000)),
    {
      etaMinutes: 0,
      status: 'Delivered',
    },
    new Date()
  );
}

You can also pass 'default' or 'immediate' instead of after(date) for the dismissal policy.

Remote updates with push notifications

When enablePushNotifications is true, you can update Live Activities remotely from your server through Apple Push Notification service (APNs).

• Use addPushToStartTokenListener to receive the app-wide push-to-start token, which lets your server start a Live Activity remotely (requires iOS 17.2 or later).
• Use instance.getPushToken() or instance.addPushTokenListener() to obtain the token for a specific running Live Activity, which lets your server send updates to that activity.

import { addPushToStartTokenListener } from 'expo-widgets';
import DeliveryActivity from './DeliveryActivity';

const pushToStartSubscription = addPushToStartTokenListener(event => {
  console.log('Push-to-start token:', event.activityPushToStartToken);
});

async function startDeliveryTracking() {
  const instance = DeliveryActivity.start({
    etaMinutes: 15,
    status: 'Your delivery is on the way',
  });

  const pushToken = await instance.getPushToken();
  console.log('Per-activity token:', pushToken);

  const subscription = instance.addPushTokenListener(event => {
    console.log('Updated push token:', event.activityId, event.pushToken);
  });

  // Later, when you no longer need updates:
  subscription.remove();
}

// Later, when you no longer need updates:
pushToStartSubscription.remove();

Send the token to your server and use it to push updates. The notification must use the liveactivity push type (the apns-push-type header) and an apns-topic of <your bundle identifier>.push-type.liveactivity. Its aps payload carries an event (start, update, or end), a timestamp, and a content-state that matches your activity's props. The content-state must match the internal content state used by expo-widgets: set name to the name you passed to createLiveActivity, and set props to a JSON string of that activity's props. Use apns-priority: 10 for immediate updates and apns-priority: 5 for lower-priority updates. The timestamp, dismissal-date, and other APNs date fields are Unix timestamps in seconds.

To start a Live Activity remotely, send a start event to the push-to-start token:

{
  "aps": {
    "timestamp": 1778832000,
    "event": "start",
    "attributes-type": "LiveActivityAttributes",
    "attributes": {},
    "content-state": {
      "name": "DeliveryActivity",
      "props": "{\"etaMinutes\":15,\"status\":\"Your delivery is on the way\"}"
    },
    "alert": {
      "title": "Delivery started",
      "body": "Your delivery is on the way"
    }
  }
}

Remote start requires iOS 17.2 or later. Include input-push-token: 1 in the aps payload on iOS 18 or later if you want APNs to provide a new per-activity token for future updates.

To update a Live Activity remotely, send an update event to that activity's per-activity token:

{
  "aps": {
    "timestamp": 1778832300,
    "event": "update",
    "content-state": {
      "name": "DeliveryActivity",
      "props": "{\"etaMinutes\":2,\"status\":\"Delivery arriving soon!\"}"
    }
  }
}

To end a Live Activity remotely, send an end event with the final content state:

{
  "aps": {
    "timestamp": 1778832600,
    "event": "end",
    "content-state": {
      "name": "DeliveryActivity",
      "props": "{\"etaMinutes\":0,\"status\":\"Delivered\"}"
    },
    "dismissal-date": 1778833200
  }
}

For the exact payload shape and headers, follow Apple's Starting and updating Live Activities with ActivityKit push notifications.

API

import { createWidget, createLiveActivity } from 'expo-widgets';

Classes

Methods

Event Subscriptions

Types