How to check if WhatsApp is installed on device?

Question

Linking.openURL(`whatsapp://send?phone=${phoneNumber}`);

The above code will navigate to WhatsApp however I'm wondering if it's possible to check existence of WhatsApp before trying to openURL

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/36419423/how-to-check-whatsapp-is-installed-in-device-in-android — Miguel Rocha, Sep 21 '18 at 09:40
@MiguelRocha: I do aware of the link but it's in Android not RN — Isaac, Sep 21 '18 at 09:41
Possible duplicate of [How to check programmatically if an application is installed or not in Android?](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/11392183/how-to-check-programmatically-if-an-application-is-installed-or-not-in-android) — Khemraj Sharma, Sep 21 '18 at 09:48
Can you try using Linking.canOpenURL()? https://facebook.github.io/react-native/docs/linking#canopenurl — rabbit87, Sep 21 '18 at 09:57

score 11 · Accepted Answer · answered Sep 21 '18 at 10:09

From React Native documentation:

To start the corresponding activity for a link (web URL, email, contact etc.), call
Linking.openURL(url).catch(err => console.error('An error occurred', err));
If you want to check if any installed app can handle a given URL beforehand you can call
Linking.canOpenURL(url).then(supported => {
  if (!supported) {
    console.log('Can\'t handle url: ' + url);
  } else {
    return Linking.openURL(url);
  }
}).catch(err => console.error('An error occurred', err));

I assume, if WhatsApp is not installed, the !supported block will be invoked and you can do your computation there.

score 2 · Answer 2 · answered Sep 21 '18 at 09:45

It can be checked using the PackageManager. Just iterate over the installed packages and compare its name to the whatsapp package name.

PackageManager packageManager = getApplicationContext().getPackageManager();
for (PackageInfo packageInfo : packageManager.getInstalledPackages(0)) {
  if (packageInfo.packageName.equals(“com.whatsapp")) {
    return true;
  }
}

How to check if WhatsApp is installed on device?

2 Answers2