Highlighting Text Color using Html.fromHtml() in Android?

Question

I am developing an application in which there will be a search screen where user can search for specific keywords and that keyword should be highlighted. I have found Html.fromHtml method.

But I will like to know whether its the proper way of doing it or not.

Please let me know your views on this.

check out for an working example. http://javatechig.com/2013/04/07/how-to-display-html-in-android-view/ — Nilanchala, Apr 07 '13 at 20:29
Possible duplicate of [Is it possible to have multiple styles inside a TextView?](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1529068/is-it-possible-to-have-multiple-styles-inside-a-textview) — blahdiblah, Oct 09 '13 at 18:59

score 225 · Accepted Answer · answered May 30 '10 at 10:14

225

Or far simpler than dealing with Spannables manually, since you didn't say that you want the background highlighted, just the text:

String styledText = "This is <font color='red'>simple</font>.";
textView.setText(Html.fromHtml(styledText), TextView.BufferType.SPANNABLE);

answered May 30 '10 at 10:14

Christopher Orr

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It's worth noting, that Html.fromHtml is slower than SpannableString, because it involves parsing. But for a short text it doesn't matter – Michał Klimczak Dec 08 '12 at 19:01
There appears to be another solution at [link](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1529068/is-it-possible-to-have-multiple-styles-inside-a-textview). See the answer by Legend. – Kenneth Evans Jan 15 '13 at 22:25
1

Just as a comment, I found I didn't need to pass TextView.BufferType.SPANNABLE and it still worked. Thanks! – James Apr 29 '14 at 13:34
1

do you know any html editor for arrenging long text for android. for example I am trying to use this site (http://www.html.am/html-editors/html-text-editor.cfm) but if I want to see source it returns color as `` so that android dont change the color. – mehmet Jun 07 '14 at 16:14
@mehmet You could presumably just search and replace to change the tags to tags with a "color" attribute. – Christopher Orr Jun 10 '14 at 10:18
Clarification for those who wonders how to use specific hex color in html: `text` – Johnny Five Mar 19 '19 at 11:42
@JohnnyFive I am trying to change – Mateen Chaudhry Apr 23 '19 at 06:18

score 44 · Answer 2 · edited Aug 29 '15 at 05:13

44

Using color value from xml resource:

int labelColor = getResources().getColor(R.color.label_color);
String сolorString = String.format("%X", labelColor).substring(2); // !!strip alpha value!!

Html.fromHtml(String.format("<font color=\"#%s\">text</font>", сolorString), TextView.BufferType.SPANNABLE);

edited Aug 29 '15 at 05:13

worked

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answered Feb 20 '13 at 18:04

SergeyA

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nicely done. useful to be able to use colors from your apps resources. – speedynomads May 07 '13 at 11:37
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I want to stress second line, where you substring the color hex: alpha value would make the color setting invalid! Don't forget it! – marcolav Mar 20 '18 at 14:34

score 13 · Answer 3 · edited Mar 29 '22 at 23:29

This can be achieved using a Spannable String. You will need to import the following

import android.text.SpannableString; 
import android.text.style.BackgroundColorSpan; 
import android.text.style.StyleSpan;

And then you can change the background of the text using something like the following:

TextView text = (TextView) findViewById(R.id.text_login);
text.setText("");
text.append("Your text here");
Spannable sText = (Spannable) text.getText();
sText.setSpan(new BackgroundColorSpan(Color.RED), 1, 4, 0);

Where this will highlight the charecters at pos 1 - 4 with a red color. Hope this helps!

score 5 · Answer 4 · answered Apr 28 '10 at 17:48

5

Alternative solution: Using a WebView instead. Html is easy to work with.

WebView webview = new WebView(this);

String summary = "<html><body>Sorry, <span style=\"background: red;\">Madonna</span> gave no results</body></html>";

webview.loadData(summary, "text/html", "utf-8");

answered Apr 28 '10 at 17:48

Vidar Vestnes

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because of fromHTML() limitations, I'm heading for a tablet app with text in every panel displayed in a WebView. Welcome to the 2020s, where everything's a web page including your tablet's text view!~ – Phlip Apr 07 '21 at 22:04

score 5 · Answer 5 · edited Jan 10 '19 at 11:36

5

font is deprecated use span instead Html.fromHtml("<span style=color:red>"+content+"</span>")

edited Jan 10 '19 at 11:36

NASSER

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answered Apr 24 '17 at 15:28

mhdtouban

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score 5 · Answer 6 · answered May 23 '17 at 11:08

 String name = modelOrderList.get(position).getName();   //get name from List
    String text = "<font color='#000000'>" + name + "</font>"; //set Black color of name
    /* check API version, according to version call method of Html class  */
    if (android.os.Build.VERSION.SDK_INT < android.os.Build.VERSION_CODES.N) {
        Log.d(TAG, "onBindViewHolder: if");
        holder.textViewName.setText(context.getString(R.string._5687982) + " ");
        holder.textViewName.append(Html.fromHtml(text));
    } else {
        Log.d(TAG, "onBindViewHolder: else");
        holder.textViewName.setText("123456" + " ");   //set text 
        holder.textViewName.append(Html.fromHtml(text, Html.FROM_HTML_MODE_LEGACY));   //append text into textView
    }

int color = getResources().getColor(R.color.any_color_name); — Khyati Vara, Jul 20 '21 at 04:05

score 1 · Answer 7 · answered Oct 05 '18 at 20:46

To make part of your text underlined and colored

in your strings.xml

<string name="text_with_colored_underline">put the text here and &lt;u>&lt;font color="#your_hexa_color">the underlined colored part here&lt;font>&lt;u></string>

then in the activity

yourTextView.setText(Html.fromHtml(getString(R.string.text_with_colored_underline)));

and for clickable links:

<string name="text_with_link"><![CDATA[<p>text before link<a href=\"http://www.google.com\">title of link</a>.<p>]]></string>

and in your activity:

yourTextView.setText(Html.fromHtml(getString(R.string.text_with_link)));
yourTextView.setMovementMethod(LinkMovementMethod.getInstance());

score 1 · Answer 8 · edited Aug 09 '20 at 21:27

1

First Convert your string into HTML then convert it into spannable. do as suggest the following codes.

 Spannable spannable = new SpannableString(Html.fromHtml(labelText));
                    
spannable.setSpan(new ForegroundColorSpan(Color.parseColor(color)), spannable.toString().indexOf("•"), spannable.toString().lastIndexOf("•") + 1, Spannable.SPAN_EXCLUSIVE_EXCLUSIVE);

edited Aug 09 '20 at 21:27

Shashank Pandey

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answered Mar 06 '20 at 07:39

Muhammad Khurram Mushtaq

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score 0 · Answer 9 · edited Feb 19 '16 at 08:24

0

textview.setText(Html.fromHtml("<font color='rgb'>"+text contain+"</font>"));

It will give the color exactly what you have made in html editor , just set the textview and concat it with the textview value. Android does not support span color, change it to font color in editor and you are all set to go.

edited Feb 19 '16 at 08:24

bummi

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answered Feb 19 '16 at 07:51

Naina

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Boken · Answer 10 · 2020-12-15T23:13:33.273

Adding also Kotlin version with:

getting text from resources (strings.xml)
getting color from resources (colors.xml)
"fetching HEX" moved as extension

fun getMulticolorSpanned(): Spanned {
    // Get text from resources
    val text: String = getString(R.string.your_text_from_resources)

    // Get color from resources and parse it to HEX (RGB) value
    val warningHexColor = getHexFromColors(R.color.your_error_color)

    // Use above string & color in HTML
    val html = "<string>$text<span style=\"color:#$warningHexColor;\">*</span></string>"

    // Parse HTML (base on API version)
    return if (Build.VERSION.SDK_INT >= Build.VERSION_CODES.N) {
        Html.fromHtml(html, Html.FROM_HTML_MODE_LEGACY)
    } else {
        Html.fromHtml(html)
    }
}

And Kotlin extension (with removing alpha):

fun Context.getHexFromColors(
    colorRes: Int
): String {
    val labelColor: Int = ContextCompat.getColor(this, colorRes)
    return String.format("%X", labelColor).substring(2)
}

Highlighting Text Color using Html.fromHtml() in Android?

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