How to Use WebViews in Flutter

WebViews are a great way to display HTML content in your Flutter app. They allow you to embed web content such as videos, maps, or other interactive content directly into your app. In this article, we'll discuss what WebViews are, how to use them in Flutter, and some tips on debugging them.

flutter webview

What Is a WebView in Flutter?

A WebView is a widget that displays web content in your Flutter app. It uses a browser engine to render webpages, and can be used to display HTML, SVG, and other web content.

How to Use WebView in Flutter?

Using a WebView in Flutter is easy. All you need to do is create an instance of the WebView widget, and provide it with the URL of the web page you want to show. Here's an example:

WebView(
  initialUrl: 'https://www.example.com/',
)

WebView Code Examples in Flutter

Here are some more examples of WebViews in Flutter.

Showing a Webpage in a Fullscreen WebView

If you want to show a web page in a fullscreen WebView, you can use the expanded parameter:

WebView(
  initialUrl: 'https://www.example.com/',
  expanded: true,
)

Showing a Webpage with a Custom User Agent

If you want to specify a custom user agent for the WebView, you can use the userAgent parameter:

WebView(
  initialUrl: 'https://www.example.com/',
  userAgent: 'MyCustomUserAgent',
)

Showing a Webpage with JavaScript Enabled

If you want to enable JavaScript in the WebView, you can use the javascriptMode parameter:

WebView(
  initialUrl: 'https://www.example.com/',
  javascriptMode: JavascriptMode.unrestricted,
)

Various WebView Properties in Flutter

The WebView widget has many properties that you can use to customize its behavior. Here are some of the more important ones:

initialUrl: The URL of the web page to be shown.
expanded: Whether the WebView should be shown in fullscreen mode.
userAgent: The custom user agent to be used by the WebView.
javascriptMode: The JavaScript mode to be used by the WebView.
debuggingEnabled: Whether to enable debugging for the WebView.

How to Debug Webviews in Flutter?

Debugging a WebView in Flutter is easy. All you need to do is set the debuggingEnabled property to true:

WebView(
  initialUrl: 'https://www.example.com/',
  debuggingEnabled: true,
)

Once you do this, you can open the Chrome DevTools by pressing the Ctrl+Shift+I (or Cmd+Option+I on macOS) keyboard shortcut.

Conclusion

In this article, we discussed how to use WebViews in Flutter and some tips on debugging them. WebViews are a great way to display HTML content in your Flutter app, and they can be easily customized with various properties. We also discussed how to enable debugging for WebViews in Flutter.