I have an activity A that start activity B passing to it some intent data. Activity B host a navigation graph from the new Navigation Architecture Component.I want to pass that intent data to the startDestination fragment as argument how to do that?

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I'm pretty sure the navigation editor has options for "arguments" and then you can add the safe-args gradle plugin but the details are a bit hazy for me atm – EpicPandaForce May 14 '18 at 16:01
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2Yes i know but there is no way to pass arguments to the start destination fragment – Ahmed Abdelmeged May 14 '18 at 16:02
12 Answers
OK, I found a solution to that problem thanks to Ian Lake from the Google team. Let say you have an activity A that will start activity B with some intent data and you want to get that data in the startDestination you have two options here if you using safe args which is my case you could do
StartFragmentArgs.fromBundle(requireActivity().intent?.extras)
to read the args from the Intent. If you don't use safe args you can extract the data from the bundle your self-using requireActivity().intent?.extras
which will return a Bundle you can use instead of the fragment getArguments()
method. That's it I try it and everything works fine.

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Where does `StartFragmentArgs` class comes from? Is it included in the navigation arch dependency? – sam33r Aug 22 '18 at 13:35
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It's a generated class by the navigation. If you are using safe argument. For example the fragment here called StartFragment so the generated arg class will be StartFragmentArgs. If the fragment called FooFragment the generated class will be FooFragmentArgs and so on – Ahmed Abdelmeged Aug 23 '18 at 11:05
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I tried using it and added this line in onCreate of Activity StartFragmentArgs.fromBundle(requireActivity().intent?.extras) but argument's sent to my startDestination are null – Anmol Nov 21 '18 at 09:34
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1When you start the activity that has the graph you are passing the data as intent and extract it in `requireActivity().intent?.extras` – Ahmed Abdelmeged Nov 21 '18 at 15:07
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2Your answer is not complete. When you use SafeArgs to set the bundle it returns the class object itself setting all the bundle arguments. But you didn't told us how to get back that bundle in fragment. If we use fromBundle it ill return a new object always, so it won't have that value anymore when you try to get it and it will be null – Cyph3rCod3r Dec 10 '18 at 10:37
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This replaces the usual `private val args: MyFragmentArgs by navArgs()` – LiMuBei Jan 13 '20 at 13:25
TLDR: You have to manually inflate the graph, add the keys/values to the defaultArgs, and set the graph on the navController
.
Step 1
The documentation tells you to set the graph in the <fragment>
tag in your Activity
's layout. Something like:
<fragment
android:id="@+id/navFragment"
android:name="androidx.navigation.fragment.NavHostFragment"
app:graph="@navigation/nav_whatever"
app:defaultNavHost="true"
/>
REMOVE the line setting the graph=
.
Step 2
In the Activity that will be displaying your NavHostFragment
, inflate the graph like so:
val navHostFragment = navFragment as NavHostFragment
val inflater = navHostFragment.navController.navInflater
val graph = inflater.inflate(R.navigation.nav_whatever)
Where navFragment
is the id you gave your fragment in XML, as above.
Step 3 [Crucial!]
Create a bundle to hold the arguments you want to pass to your startDestination
fragment and add it to the graph's default arguments:
val bundle = Bundle()
// ...add keys and values
graph.addDefaultArguments(bundle)
Step 4
Set the graph on the host's navController
:
navHostFragment.navController.graph = graph

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Your solution will work but quite complex i found a better way i will but in the other answer – Ahmed Abdelmeged May 22 '18 at 11:25
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26This solution is not working anymore in 1.0.0-alpha09. The `addDefaultArgument` function has been removed. – Boonya Kitpitak Dec 21 '18 at 04:27
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addDefaultArgument has been removed from Navigation Architecture Component. Please have a look at my answer below to see the official recommended approach. – Praveen Singh Nov 28 '19 at 07:26
I think this has changed again with the 1.0.0 release. And Google has hidden this information very well in the official documentation. Or at least I struggled to find it, but stumbled upon it in the Migrate to the Navigation component guide. How to pass arguments to the start destination is mentioned here: Pass activity destination args to a start destination fragment
In short
- You have to set the navigation graph programatically:
findNavController(R.id.main_content)
.setGraph(R.navigation.product_detail_graph, intent.extras)
- Don't set the graph in the NavHostFragment XML declaration.
- Read the extras from the receiver side:
val args by navArgs<ProductDetailsArgs>()
val productId = args.productId
Update: Google has said that the official documentation for passing arguments to the initial navigation target is indeed missing. Hopefully this is added soon as part of the Navigation component documentation.

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Hi @Johan Paul Can you please tell me what is R.id.main_content in this? – rupesh Aug 30 '19 at 06:49
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@rupesh It is the ID for the NavHostFragment where you would normally specify the navigation graph in the XML layout file. – Johan Paul Aug 30 '19 at 10:42
It had been fixed in 1.0.0-alpha07
. See detail.
The solution is similar to Elliot Schrock's answer, but wrapping by official API.
We have to manually inflate NavHostFragment
or graph
Use
NavHostFragment.create(R.navigation.graph, args)
Or
navController.setGraph(R.navigation.graph, args)
The args are the data we want to pass to start destination.

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Following Pass data to the start destination section from official doc:
First, construct a Bundle that holds the data:
val bundle = Bundle().apply {
putString(KEY, "value")
}
Next, use one of the following methods to pass the Bundle to the start destination:
If you're creating your NavHost programmatically
NavHostFragment.create(R.navigation.graph, bundle)
Otherwise, you can set start destination arguments by calling one of the following overloads of
NavController.setGraph()
:navHostFragment.navController.setGraph(R.navigation.graph, bundle)
Then you should use Fragment.getArguments()
to retrieve the data in your start destination.
EDIT:
You can also use FragmentArgs
instead of creating a bundle manually which makes it more convenient and type safe:
navHostFragment.navController.setGraph(R.navigation.graph, MyFragmentArgs(arg).toBundle())
Then in the fragment you can retrieve args as:
private val args: PodFragmentArgs by navArgs()
Make sure your fragment has argument element in the navigation.xml file:
<fragment
android:id="@+id/myFragment"
android:name="MyFragment"
android:label="fragment_my"
tools:layout="@layout/fragment_my">
<argument
android:name="argName"
android:defaultValue="@null"
app:argType="string"
app:nullable="true" />
</fragment>

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So finally, I have found a solution to this issue.
At the time of writing this answer, I am using Navigation 2.2.0-alpha01
If you want to pass some data to the start destination directly as arguments from host activity, you need to manually set your host’s navigation graph inside the host activity’s onCreate() method, as shown below:
Get you navController:
val navController by lazy { findNavController(R.id.<your_nav_host_id>) }
Then in the host activity's onCreate()
val bundle = Bundle()
bundle.putString("some_argument", "some_value")
navController.setGraph(R.navigation.<you_nav_graph_xml>, bundle)
Or if you want to pass the whole intent extras as it is to the startDestination:
navController.setGraph(R.navigation.<you_nav_graph_xml>, intent.extras)
Since intent.extras
would return a Bundle
only
When you are setting the navGraph using setGraph() method, you should avoid setting the app:NavGraph attribute in the NavHostFragment definition, because doing so results in inflating and setting the navigation graph twice.
While reading these arguments in your startDestination fragment:
If you are using the Safe Args Plugin (which is very much recommended), then in your fragment:
private val args by navArgs<DummyFragmentArgs>()
Safe Args plugin would generate an Args class by appending Args to your fragment name. For example, if you fragment is called DummyFragment
then Safe Args would generate a class called DummyFragmentArgs
where navArgs<>
is an extension function defined in Android KTX
If you are not using Android KTX, you can get the args object like:
val args = DummyFragmentArgs.fromBundle(arguments!!)
Once you've acquired the arguments object, you can simply fetch your arguments:
args.someArgument
Notice how we passed "some_argument"
as argument, and we are reading it as someArgument
using Safe Args
If you are not using Safe Args (there is no reason to not use it though), you can access your arguments like this:
arguments?.getString("some_argument")
All of this is documented in Migrate to Navigation Component documentation here: https://developer.android.com/guide/navigation/navigation-migrate#pass_activity_destination_args_to_a_start_destination_fragment

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addDefaultArguments is no more in the latest versions of library. I have fixed the problem like this:
val navHostFragment = fragment_navigation_onboarding as NavHostFragment
val navController = navHostFragment.navController
val navInflater = navController.navInflater
val graph:NavGraph = navInflater.inflate(R.navigation.navigation_your_xml)
val model = Model()//you might get it from another activity
graph.addArgument("Data", NavArgument.Builder().setDefaultValue(model).build()) // This is where you pass the bundle data from Activity to StartDestination
navHostFragment.navController.graph = graph

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After reading the solution i made one that suits for my needs, this solution assume that the data sent to the activity that host this graph
on the start destination:
@Override
public void onAttach(Context context) {
super.onAttach(context);
// work around get get starting destination with activity bundle
userId = getActivity().getIntent().getIntExtra(KEY_USER_ID, -1);
}

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So for the people Still struggling with this. I found another way to do this without using Safe-Args and a step using @Elliot's Answer.
So lets say you received some arguments in Activity B from Activity A and Your Activity B has a fragment startDestination you are initialising the Nav controller like this:
navController = Navigation.findNavController(this, R.id.detailFragment);
from the Nav Controller you will have access to your graph which you have set in the XML like this and you can set the arguments in the defaultArguments:
navController.getGraph().addDefaultArguments(extras);
Note: This will also update values of the keys if it is already present in the graph xml
Now in your Fragment you have to find the default arguments from your NavHostFragment like this:
Bundle defaultArguments = NavHostFragment.findNavController(this).getGraph().getDefaultArguments();
and you will have the values there. I don't know why @Elliot thinks it's crucial but it should be the way?
UPDATE alpha09: addDefault argument is no longer supported in this version, You have to use NavArgument

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You can pass data to your app's start destination. First, you must explicitly construct a Bundle that holds the data. Next, use one of the following methods to pass the Bundle to the start destination
you can set manually graph from the code and add argument with it and remove app:navGraph
from xml and use this line of code in activity
navController.setGraph(R.navigation.graph, args)

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I've used answer from Elliot Schrock, but added bundle in different method
navController.setGraph(R.navigation.nav_graph, intent.extras!!)

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class HadithActivity : AppCompatActivity() {
override fun onCreate(savedInstanceState: Bundle?) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState)
setContentView(R.layout.activity_hadith)
val navHostFragment =
supportFragmentManager.findFragmentById(R.id.fragmentContainerView) as NavHostFragment
val navController = navHostFragment.navController
navController.setGraph(R.navigation.nav_hadith, intent.extras)
}
}
activity_hadith.xml
<androidx.fragment.app.FragmentContainerView
android:id="@+id/fragmentContainerView"
android:name="androidx.navigation.fragment.NavHostFragment"
android:layout_width="match_parent"
android:layout_height="match_parent"
app:defaultNavHost="true"
app:navGraph="@navigation/nav_hadith" />

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