Linking Native API

Linking API enables you to both send and receive links between applications. For example, opening the Phone app with number dialed in or opening the Google Maps and starting a navigation to a chosen destination. You can also utilise Linking to make your app able to respond to links opening it from other applications.

To use Linking you need to first import it from react-native

import {Linking} from 'react-native'

Outgoing Links

To open a link call openURL.

Linking.openURL(url)
.catch(err => console.error('An error occurred ', err))

The preferred method is to check if any installed app can handle a given URL beforehand.

Linking.canOpenURL(url)
.then(supported => {
  if (!supported) {
    console.log('Unsupported URL: ' + url)
  } else {
    return Linking.openURL(url)
  }
}).catch(err => console.error('An error occurred ', err))

URI Schemes

Target App	Example	Reference
Web Browser	https://stackoverflow.com
Phone	tel:1-408-555-5555	Apple (opens new window)
Mail	mailto:email@example.com	Apple (opens new window)
SMS	sms:1-408-555-1212	Apple (opens new window)
Apple Maps	http://maps.apple.com/?ll=37.484847,-122.148386	Apple (opens new window)
Google Maps	geo:37.7749,-122.4194	Google (opens new window)
iTunes	See iTunes Link Maker (opens new window)	Apple (opens new window)
Facebook	fb://profile	Stack Overflow (opens new window)
YouTube	http://www.youtube.com/v/oHg5SJYRHA0	Apple (opens new window)
Facetime	facetime://user@example.com	Apple (opens new window)
iOS Calendar	calshow:514300000 [1]	iPhoneDevWiki (opens new window)

[1] Opens the calendar at the stated number of seconds since 1. 1. 2001 (UTC?). For some reason this API is undocumented by Apple.

Incomming Links

You can detect when your app is launched from an external URL.

componentDidMount() {
  const url = Linking.getInitialURL()
  .then((url) => {
    if (url) {
      console.log('Initial url is: ' + url)
    }
  }).catch(err => console.error('An error occurred ', err))
}

To enable this on iOS Link RCTLinking to your project (opens new window).

To enable this on Android, follow these steps (opens new window).