In Android EditText, how to force writing uppercase?

Question

In my Android application I have different EditText where the user can enter information. But I need to force user to write in uppercase letters. Do you know a function to do that?

score 389 · Answer 1 · edited May 22 '18 at 09:54

389

Android actually has a built-in InputFilter just for this!

edittext.setFilters(new InputFilter[] {new InputFilter.AllCaps()});

Be careful, setFilters will reset all other attributes which were set via XML (i.e. maxLines, inputType,imeOptinos...). To prevent this, add you Filter(s) to the already existing ones.

InputFilter[] editFilters = <EditText>.getFilters();
InputFilter[] newFilters = new InputFilter[editFilters.length + 1];
System.arraycopy(editFilters, 0, newFilters, 0, editFilters.length);
newFilters[editFilters.length] = <YOUR_FILTER>;  
<EditText>.setFilters(newFilters);

edited May 22 '18 at 09:54

Kaushik

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answered Aug 29 '14 at 15:26

ErlVolton

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this is the best answer : the lower case letters are converted automatically. Simple and efficient. Thanks – Guian Oct 08 '14 at 08:40
3

Yes! This is the best answer! The code should be `edittext.setFilters(new InputFilter[] {new InputFilter.AllCaps()});` though. – Arthur Oct 17 '14 at 13:45
this should be the answer and @Arthur is right it should be `edittext.setFilters(new InputFilter[] {new InputFilter.AllCaps()});` – Axel Oct 27 '14 at 15:44
4

OK you folks were right, I updated my answer. Thanks for helping improve this!! – ErlVolton Oct 28 '14 at 14:32
3

Anyway to do this in xml? – Johan Jan 30 '15 at 08:36
this is the simplest answer i've found. – Mohammad Ersan Feb 05 '15 at 16:34
Instead of uppercasing the text using TextWatcher I found this as better answer. My life now is a lie. +1 For this – Glenn Sep 14 '15 at 02:32
4

To avoid overriding the filters you set on xml (for eg. `maxLength`), try to append the `InputFilter.AllCaps()` to `editText.getFilters` array. See http://stackoverflow.com/a/18934659/3890983 – tropicalfish Aug 26 '16 at 07:48
@Johan see http://android--code.blogspot.com/2015/08/android-edittext-all-caps.html. This could be included in the answer too in fact. – ibizaman Sep 20 '16 at 14:57
1

And set EditText xml property to: `android:inputType="text|textCapCharacters"` – ErickBergmann Apr 06 '17 at 17:53
It works @ErickBergmann. But after finding the solution I think, why not just parsing data to Capital in the save button – Hanako Sep 21 '18 at 19:19
38

Or in Kotlin just `editText.filters = editText.filters + InputFilter.AllCaps()` – Ilia Kurtov Sep 27 '18 at 16:35
22

Better yet: `editText.filters += InputFilter.AllCaps()` Kotlin's wonderful! <3 – Milack27 Jun 07 '19 at 16:20

score 137 · Answer 2 · edited Sep 07 '17 at 10:38

137

If you want ~~to force user to write in~~ uppercase letters by default in your EditText, you just need to add android:inputType="textCapCharacters". (User can still manually change to lowercase.)

edited Sep 07 '17 at 10:38

Jonik

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answered Oct 24 '13 at 02:04

Aoyama Nanami

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nothing prevents the User press 'shift' and write a letter lowercased. – Fernando Leal Jul 16 '14 at 19:35
Agree with Fernando, while it does default the keyboard to caps, it does not require them. – pforhan Feb 04 '15 at 16:05
User can use shift button to enter small case letter as said by @Fernando – Ajinkya May 09 '16 at 05:13
this is a good solution to let force user to start with and continue typing in Capitals. Not force him, he can anyway choose to write in lowercase from Keyboard – sud007 Sep 18 '20 at 10:08

score 26 · Answer 3 · edited Jan 13 '21 at 20:12

26

It is not possible to force a capslock only via the XML. Also 3rd party libraries do not help. You could do a toUpper() on the text on the receiving side, but there's no way to prevent it on the keyboard side

You can use XML to set the keyboard to caps lock.

Java

You can set the input_type to TYPE_CLASS_TEXT| TYPE_TEXT_FLAG_CAP_CHARACTERS. The keyboard should honor that.

Kotlin

android:inputType="textCapCharacters"

edited Jan 13 '21 at 20:12

kuzdu

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answered Apr 12 '13 at 01:57

Gabe Sechan

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android:inputType="textCapCharacters" – Parth Kapoor May 18 '20 at 07:55
2

I really don't know why this answer has so many upvotes. The solution doesn't avoid that the user disable capslock... – kuzdu Jan 13 '21 at 12:56
@kuzdu Since there's no API for keyboards to control that, especially not in 3rd party keyboards, there's no way to prevent that. You could do a toUpper() on the text on the receiving side, but there's no way to prevent it on the keyboard side. – Gabe Sechan Jan 13 '21 at 14:36

score 24 · Answer 4 · edited Sep 12 '19 at 05:28

24

You can used two way.

First Way:

Set android:inputType="textCapSentences" on your EditText.

Second Way:

When user enter the number you have to used text watcher and change small to capital letter.

edittext.addTextChangedListener(new TextWatcher() {

    @Override
    public void onTextChanged(CharSequence arg0, int arg1, int arg2, int arg3) {            

    }
        @Override
    public void beforeTextChanged(CharSequence arg0, int arg1, int arg2,
                    int arg3) {             
    }
    @Override
    public void afterTextChanged(Editable et) {
          String s=et.toString();
      if(!s.equals(s.toUpperCase()))
      {
         s=s.toUpperCase();
         edittext.setText(s);
         edittext.setSelection(edittext.length()); //fix reverse texting
      }
    }
});

edited Sep 12 '19 at 05:28

richard1994x

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answered Apr 12 '13 at 05:02

Harshid

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your solution does not work because it sets the string on a reverse order. – not 0x12 May 21 '13 at 06:16
which way you used first or second. – Harshid May 21 '13 at 06:26
First one is not working at all. The second one makes the text upper case but we must programmetically set the cursor to the end of the sentence. – not 0x12 May 21 '13 at 06:55
@Kalanamith ya then what's problem – Harshid May 21 '13 at 07:21
Why do something programmatically when Android does it for you? – James Goodwin Dec 12 '13 at 22:19
6

For first option textCapSentences capitalises sentences, you need textCapCharacters. – Ghoti Jan 09 '14 at 12:42
android:inputType="textCapCharacters" – Ashwin H Nov 22 '19 at 09:54

score 16 · Answer 5 · answered Dec 13 '17 at 06:05

16

Use input filter

editText = (EditText) findViewById(R.id.enteredText);
editText.setFilters(new InputFilter[]{new InputFilter.AllCaps()});

answered Dec 13 '17 at 06:05

Sreejesh K Nair

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it is causing issue when i press backspace/remove btn – Zohab Ali Apr 20 '21 at 12:32

score 15 · Answer 6 · answered Nov 07 '17 at 17:23

15

Even better... one liner in Kotlin...

// gets your previous attributes in XML, plus adds AllCaps filter    
<your_edit_text>.setFilters(<your_edit_text>.getFilters() + InputFilter.AllCaps())

Done!

answered Nov 07 '17 at 17:23

S Pimenta

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You can write it using the property access syntax: `.filters = .filters + InputFilter.AllCaps()` – Makotosan Dec 18 '17 at 21:27
12

Better yet: `.filters += InputFilter.AllCaps()` – Makotosan Dec 18 '17 at 21:31

Abhishek · Answer 7 · 2017-10-17T09:51:41.527

14

You can add the android:textAllCaps="true" property to your xml file in the EditText. This will enforce the softinput keyboard to appear in all caps mode. The value you enter will appear in Uppercase. However, this won't ensure that the user can only enter in UpperCase letters. If they want, they can still fall back to the lower case letters. If you want to ensure that the output of the Edittext is in All caps, then you have to manually convert the input String using toUpperCase() method of String class.

edited Oct 17 '17 at 09:51

answered Feb 20 '15 at 10:53

Abhishek

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@GustavoAlves, Can you just tell me what happened when you tried this ? May be I can look into your issue. :) – Abhishek Feb 25 '16 at 08:25
Hi @Abhishek. Setting the property didn't change anything. The EditText still accept both uppercase and lowercase characters. – Gus Costa Feb 25 '16 at 13:02
1

Yes if you want to restrict your EditText only to accept Uppercase characters then for you, android:inputType = "textCapCharacters" would be the right option. Give it a try and then let me know. ☺️ – Abhishek Feb 25 '16 at 15:47
1

This caused and index out of bounds exception when every I typed. – Zapnologica Nov 24 '16 at 11:03
can you give me the Java code snippet where you are tying to get the String from EditText ?? – Abhishek Nov 25 '16 at 11:23
3

`android:textAllCaps="true"` is only a property of TextView (https://stackoverflow.com/a/28803492/5268730). Use `android:inputType="textCapCharacters"` instead. – woodii Apr 13 '18 at 12:14

score 13 · Answer 8 · edited Feb 06 '17 at 11:18

13

You should put android:inputType="textCapCharacters" with Edittext in xml file.

edited Feb 06 '17 at 11:18

Garg

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answered Apr 29 '15 at 08:20

Pabel

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AoyamaNanami wrote exactly the same answer. Please focus on more current questions, this one is from 2013. :) – ByteHamster Apr 29 '15 at 08:37
2

Notice that user can shift and enter lower characters – Rafa0809 Aug 25 '17 at 16:07

anthonycr · Answer 9 · 2015-02-09T18:24:06.777

Rather than worry about dealing with the keyboard, why not just accept any input, lowercase or uppercase and convert the string to uppercase?

The following code should help:

EditText edit = (EditText)findViewById(R.id.myEditText);
String input;
....
input = edit.getText();
input = input.toUpperCase(); //converts the string to uppercase

This is user-friendly since it is unnecessary for the user to know that you need the string in uppercase. Hope this helps.

score 10 · Answer 10 · answered Jun 18 '19 at 05:02

For me it worked by adding android:textAllCaps="true" and android:inputType="textCapCharacters"

<android.support.design.widget.TextInputEditText
                    android:layout_width="fill_parent"
                    android:layout_height="@dimen/edit_text_height"
                    android:textAllCaps="true"
                    android:inputType="textCapCharacters"
                    />

score 9 · Answer 11 · answered Jul 29 '18 at 14:07

In kotlin, in .kt file make changes:

edit_text.filters = edit_text.filters + InputFilter.AllCaps()

Use synthetic property for direct access of widget with id. And in XML, for your edit text add a couple of more flag as:

<EditText
    android:id="@+id/edit_text_qr_code"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="wrap_content"
    ...other attributes...
    android:textAllCaps="true"
    android:inputType="textCapCharacters"
    />

This will update the keyboard as upper case enabled.

Nivedh · Answer 12 · 2019-06-11T10:07:31.437

9

Try using any one of the below code may solve your issue.

programatically:

editText.filters = editText.filters + InputFilter.AllCaps()

XML :

android:inputType="textCapCharacters" with Edittext

edited Jun 11 '19 at 10:07

answered Jun 10 '19 at 09:24

Nivedh

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score 8 · Answer 13 · edited Oct 12 '14 at 02:25

edittext.addTextChangedListener(new TextWatcher() {

    @Override
    public void onTextChanged(CharSequence arg0, int arg1, int arg2, int arg3) {            

    }
        @Override
    public void beforeTextChanged(CharSequence arg0, int arg1, int arg2,
                    int arg3) {             
    }
    @Override
    public void afterTextChanged(Editable et) {
          String s=et.toString();
      if(!s.equals(s.toUpperCase()))
      {
         s=s.toUpperCase();
         edittext.setText(s);
      }
      editText.setSelection(editText.getText().length());
    }
});

score 6 · Answer 14 · edited Aug 06 '18 at 05:09

6

Just do this:

// ****** Every first letter capital in word *********
<EditText
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="wrap_content"
    android:inputType="textCapWords"
    />

//***** if all letters are capital ************

    android:inputType="textCapCharacters"

edited Aug 06 '18 at 05:09

Pang

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answered Oct 19 '16 at 11:14

Pravin Suthar

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Vlad · Answer 15 · 2020-08-27T05:35:29.240

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Simple kotlin realization

fun EditText.onlyUppercase() {
    inputType = InputType.TYPE_CLASS_TEXT or InputType.TYPE_TEXT_FLAG_CAP_CHARACTERS
    filters = arrayOf(InputFilter.AllCaps())
}

PS it seems that filters is always empty initially

edited Aug 27 '20 at 05:35

answered Nov 17 '18 at 19:10

Vlad

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score 6 · Answer 16 · answered Dec 18 '19 at 11:26

6

try this code it will make your input into upper case

edittext.setFilters(new InputFilter[] {new InputFilter.AllCaps()});

answered Dec 18 '19 at 11:26

Agil anbu

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score 3 · Answer 17 · answered Aug 16 '17 at 16:52

3

Based on the accepted answer, this answer does the same, but in Kotlin. Just to ease copypasting :·)

private fun EditText.autocapitalize() {
    val allCapsFilter = InputFilter.AllCaps()
    setFilters(getFilters() + allCapsFilter)
}

answered Aug 16 '17 at 16:52

Roc Boronat

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`filters += InputFilter.AllCaps()` :D – crgarridos Apr 24 '18 at 17:27

akshay shetty · Answer 18 · 2019-03-14T09:26:32.100

3

To get all capital, use the following in your XML:

<EditText
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="wrap_content"
    android:textAllCaps="true"
    android:inputType="textCapCharacters"
/>

edited Mar 14 '19 at 09:26

answered Jul 10 '18 at 10:25

akshay shetty

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have you tried this solution? this results in crash of application when user start to edit the content of editext – surhidamatya Jan 14 '19 at 06:15

score 1 · Answer 19 · answered Jul 25 '16 at 05:58

To get capitalized keyboard when click edittext use this code in your xml,

<EditText
    android:id="@+id/et"
    android:layout_width="250dp"
    android:layout_height="wrap_content"
    android:hint="Input your country"
    android:padding="10dp"
    android:inputType="textCapCharacters"
    />

score 1 · Answer 20 · edited Apr 24 '18 at 19:05

I'm using Visual Studio 2015/Xamarin to build my app for both Android 5.1 and Android 6.0 (same apk installed on both).

When I specified android:inputType="textCapCharacters" in my axml, the AllCaps keyboard appeared as expected on Android 6.0, but not Android 5.1. I added android:textAllCaps="true" to my axml and still no AllCaps keyboard on Android 5.1. I set a filter using EditText.SetFilters(new IInputFilter[] { new InputFilterAllCaps() }); and while the soft keyboard shows lower case characters on Android 5.1, the input field is now AllCaps.

EDIT: The behavioral differences that I observed and assumed to be OS-related were actually because I had different versions of Google Keyboard on the test devices. Once I updated the devices to the latest Google Keyboard (released July 2016 as of this writing), the 'All Caps' behavior was consistent across OSes. Now, all devices show lower-case characters on the keyboard, but the input is All Caps because of SetFilters(new IInputFilter[] { new InputFilterAllCaps() });

Hi Tony, it seems you have created 2 accounts; http://stackoverflow.com/users/6764633/tony-celia and http://stackoverflow.com/users/6771440/deeveedee. If you want to merge them, see http://stackoverflow.com/help/merging-accounts. — Matt, Sep 17 '16 at 09:57
Thanks, Matt. Chalk this one up to beginner learning/mistakes. Didn't remember that I had created another account until you pointed it out. fortunately, the account merge function was simple. Great forum! — Tony, Mar 06 '17 at 15:30

score 1 · Answer 21 · answered Nov 01 '18 at 13:40

1

Xamarin equivalent of ErlVolton's answer:

editText.SetFilters(editText.GetFilters().Append(new InputFilterAllCaps()).ToArray());

answered Nov 01 '18 at 13:40

stovroz

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score 0 · Answer 22 · answered May 31 '19 at 00:59

0

A Java 1-liner of the proposed solution could be:

editText.setFilters(Lists.asList(new InputFilter.AllCaps(), editText.getFilters())
    .toArray(new InputFilter[editText.getFilters().length + 1]));

Note it needs com.google.common.collect.Lists.

answered May 31 '19 at 00:59

boriguen

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score 0 · Answer 23 · answered Sep 22 '21 at 19:28

2021: Answer

This is the only latest answer if you want to get the EditText from EditTextPreference.

In order to change the EditText value or attributes, you need to set setOnBindEditTextListener callback as per the new AndroidX Kotlin.

findPreference<EditTextPreference>("key")?.setOnBindEditTextListener {
    it.filters = arrayOf<InputFilter>(InputFilter.AllCaps())
}

score 0 · Answer 24 · answered Apr 25 '22 at 11:49

0

You can use android:inputType="textCapCharacters|textAutoComplete" in XML file

answered Apr 25 '22 at 11:49

imok1948

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score 0 · Answer 25 · answered May 27 '22 at 23:28

On your XML side where you use an editText, this code below will force the input-user-text to make them all capital without Java code but XML:

    android:inputType="textAutoCorrect|none|numberSigned|textMultiLine|textNoSuggestions|number|datetime|textWebEmailAddress|textPersonName|textCapSentences|textPassword|textAutoComplete|textImeMultiLine|numberDecimal"

These can make the text input area all in capital by force with no doubt. If you want to make not AllCaps, to turn off, don't write "numberSigned" in your XML code above.

score 0 · Answer 26 · answered Mar 10 '23 at 13:41

For Jetpack Compose TextField, it can be achieved in these ways

Setting a keyboard option

keyboardOptions = KeyboardOptions(capitalization = KeyboardCapitalization.Characters)

Or applying a visual transformation

class CapsCharacterVisualTransformation: VisualTransformation {
    override fun filter(text: AnnotatedString): TransformedText {
      return TransformedText(AnnotatedString(text.text.uppercase()), OffsetMapping.Identity)
    }
}

// usage
visualTransformation = CapsCharacterVisualTransformation()

score -1 · Answer 27 · edited Mar 31 '17 at 13:19

-1

Simply, Add below code to your EditText of your xml file.

android:digits="ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ"

And if you want to allow both uppercase text and digits then use below code.

android:digits="ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ1234567890"

edited Mar 31 '17 at 13:19

Nikhil

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answered Mar 31 '17 at 13:17

Khusboo

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That works for sure, but it's not a very nice user experience. I just tried it out and as the keyboard doesn't autocapitalise (on N at least), lowercase typed characters are just ignored with no feedback to the user, making the UI seem broken. – MattMatt Apr 13 '17 at 22:16
completely agree with @MattMatt. If we do it the user will not be able to type small case letters. The user should be able to type whatever case he/she wants and the rest should auto uppercase the words – Mir Adnan Jun 18 '17 at 23:31
I don't understand the downvotes. This is not the solution but another strategy, and it could be supplementary. In my case the user is setting a new password and the characters are not shown by default, if I let him write lowercase and convert to uppercase behind user's back it could lead to errors if he doesn't check what is writing. I think setting `android:inputType="textCapCharacters"` together with `android:digits="ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ1234567890"` is the best approach for users still trying to write lowercase. – marcRDZ Aug 29 '23 at 07:05

In Android EditText, how to force writing uppercase?

27 Answers27

2021: Answer

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