Creating a custom Android AlertDialog

This is a repost of an answer I wrote on Stack Overflow.

AlertDialog with a custom layout

Sometimes the standard AlertDialogs just don’t meet your needs. It’s not difficult to create a custom alert, though. This post will show you a minimal example. When we’re done, you can follow the same procedure to add any layout you want.

Create a custom layout

A layout with an EditText is used for this simple example, but you can replace it with anything you like.

custom_layout.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
              android:orientation="vertical"
              android:paddingLeft="20dp"
              android:paddingRight="20dp"
              android:layout_width="match_parent"
              android:layout_height="match_parent">
    <EditText
        android:id="@+id/editText"
        android:layout_width="match_parent"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"/>
</LinearLayout>

Use the dialog in code

The key parts are

• using setView to assign the custom layout to the AlertDialog.Builder
• sending any data back to the activity when a dialog button is…