Expo AV iconExpo AV

A universal library that provides separate APIs for Audio and Video playback.

Android
iOS
tvOS
Web
Bundled version:
~16.0.8

Deprecated: The Video and Audio APIs from expo-av have now been deprecated and replaced by improved versions in expo-video and expo-audio. We recommend using those libraries instead. expo-av is not receiving patches and will be removed in SDK 55.

The Audio.Sound objects and Video components share a unified imperative API for media playback.

Note that for Video, all of the operations are also available via props on the component. However, we recommend using this imperative playback API for most applications where finer control over the state of the video playback is needed.

See the playlist example app for an example on the playback API for both Audio.Sound and Video.

Audio recording APIs are not available on tvOS (Apple TV).

Installation

Terminal
npx expo install expo-av

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-av 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. If your app does not use CNG, then you'll need to manually configure the library.

Example app.json with config plugin

app.json
{ "expo": { "plugins": [ [ "expo-av", { "microphonePermission": "Allow $(PRODUCT_NAME) to access your microphone." } ] ] } }

Configurable properties

NameDefaultDescription
microphonePermission"Allow $(PRODUCT_NAME) to access your microphone"
Only for:
iOS

A string to set the NSMicrophoneUsageDescription permission message.

Are you using this library in an existing React Native app?

If you're not using Continuous Native Generation (CNG) (you're using native android and ios projects manually), then you need to configure following permissions in your native projects:

  • For Android, add android.permission.RECORD_AUDIO permission to your project's android/app/src/main/AndroidManifest.xml:

    <uses-permission android:name="android.permission.RECORD_AUDIO" />
  • For iOS, add NSMicrophoneUsageDescription to your project's ios/[app]/Info.plist:

    <key>NSMicrophoneUsageDescription</key> <string>Allow $(PRODUCT_NAME) to access your microphone</string>

Usage

On this page, we reference operations on playbackObject. Here is an example of obtaining access to the reference for both sound and video:

Example: Audio.Sound

await Audio.setAudioModeAsync({ playsInSilentModeIOS: true }); const playbackObject = new Audio.Sound(); // OR const { sound: playbackObject } = await Audio.Sound.createAsync( { uri: 'http://foo/bar.mp3' }, { shouldPlay: true } );

See the audio documentation for further information on Audio.Sound.createAsync().

Example: Video

%%placeholder-start%%... %%placeholder-end%% _handleVideoRef = component => { const playbackObject = component; ... } %%placeholder-start%%... %%placeholder-end%% render() { return ( <Video ref={this._handleVideoRef} /> %%placeholder-start%%... %%placeholder-end%% ) }

See the video documentation for further information.

Example: setOnPlaybackStatusUpdate()

_onPlaybackStatusUpdate = playbackStatus => { if (!playbackStatus.isLoaded) { // Update your UI for the unloaded state if (playbackStatus.error) { console.log(`Encountered a fatal error during playback: ${playbackStatus.error}`); // Send Expo team the error on Slack or the forums so we can help you debug! } } else { // Update your UI for the loaded state if (playbackStatus.isPlaying) { // Update your UI for the playing state } else { // Update your UI for the paused state } if (playbackStatus.isBuffering) { // Update your UI for the buffering state } if (playbackStatus.didJustFinish && !playbackStatus.isLooping) { // The player has just finished playing and will stop. Maybe you want to play something else? } %%placeholder-start%%... %%placeholder-end%% } }; // Load the playbackObject and obtain the reference. playbackObject.setOnPlaybackStatusUpdate(this._onPlaybackStatusUpdate);

Example: Loop media exactly 20 times

const N = 20; %%placeholder-start%%... %%placeholder-end%% _onPlaybackStatusUpdate = playbackStatus => { if (playbackStatus.didJustFinish) { if (this.state.numberOfLoops == N - 1) { playbackObject.setIsLooping(false); } this.setState({ numberOfLoops: this.state.numberOfLoops + 1 }); } }; %%placeholder-start%%... %%placeholder-end%% this.setState({ numberOfLoops: 0 }); // Load the playbackObject and obtain the reference. playbackObject.setOnPlaybackStatusUpdate(this._onPlaybackStatusUpdate); playbackObject.setIsLooping(true);

What is seek tolerance and why would I want to use it 
iOS

When asked to seek an A/V item, native player in iOS sometimes may seek to a slightly different time. This technique, mentioned in Apple documentation, is used to shorten the time of the seekTo call (the player may decide to play immediately from a different time than requested, instead of decoding the exact requested part and playing it with the decoding delay).

If precision is important, you can specify the tolerance with which the player will seek. However, this will result in an increased delay.

API

import { Audio, Video } from 'expo-av';

No API data file found, sorry!

Permissions

Android

You must add the following permissions to your app.json inside the expo.android.permissions array.

Android PermissionDescription

RECORD_AUDIO

Allows an application to record audio.

iOS

The following usage description keys are used by this library:

Info.plist KeyDescription

NSMicrophoneUsageDescription

A message that tells the user why the app is requesting access to the device’s microphone.