Take your media display and playback to the next level — basic, better, and best

This guide charts the optimal progression of a media playback-focused app from a likely starting place to best-in-class. It's designed to help you think about scaling your app over time, and what features to implement when. While every media consumption app is different, consider these recommendations to achieve a best-in-class experience.

Basic media display and playback

A basic media display and playback app provides users with a foundational experience, which may include doing the following:

• Offer an in-app media player using with playback controls, using formats that are supported across the Android ecosystem, ideally using Media3s ExoPlayer.
• Use the latest version of the Jetpack Media3 library.
• Use optimized server-generated thumbnails as well as best practices for locally-generated ones, and cache them locally.
• Invest in accessibility.

Better media display and playback

A better media display and playback app leverages premium device hardware and updated platform features, to:

• Implement a MediaSession — made easy with Media3s ExoPlayer — to enable playback integration across different apps, system components, and devices.
• Use best practices for sharing video, transcoding if necessary.
• Support sharing multiple pieces of content at the same time.
• Enable picture-in-picture for video and audio playback so users can multitask.
• Enable support for UltraHDR images.
• Play HDR video.
• Support playback to Cast devices.
• Add an app widget so users can get see what friends are up to and search from their home screen.

Best media display and playback

A best-in-class media display and playback app gives users access to advanced features that really make the app stand out, such as:

• Check to see if images contain a gain-map, and strategically use setColorMode() to ActivityInfo.COLOR_MODE_HDR to optimize for content display and battery life.
• Optimize for foldables by supporting the HALF_OPENED state
• Ensure design consistency with the platform.
• Implement Cast Connect so users can cast to your Android TV app.
• Use Performance Class to adapt your user experience to match device capabilities.