Curved Text in Android using Jetpack Compose

In Android, there are no inbuilt schemes to implement designed text like the word art, which is available in applications like MS Word. We can always refer to or download such schemes like designed font faces to implement designed text. However, it is also possible to natively build (building from scratch) such designed texts in an Android Project.

So in this article, we will show you how you could create a Curved Text in Android using Jetpack Compose. Follow the below steps once the IDE is ready.

Step by Step Implementation

Step 1: Create a New Project in Android Studio

To create a new project in Android Studio please refer to How to Create/Start a New Project in Android Studio. While choosing the template, select Empty Compose Activity. If you do not find this template, try upgrading the Android Studio to the latest version. We demonstrated the application in Kotlin, so make sure you select Kotlin as the primary language while creating a New Project.

Step 2: Working with the MainActivity.kt file

Go to the MainActivity.kt file and refer to the following code. Below is the code for the MainActivity.kt file. Comments are added inside the code to understand the code in more detail.

Kotlin

package com.geeksforgeeks.jccurvedtext

import android.graphics.Paint
import android.graphics.Path
import android.os.Bundle
import androidx.activity.ComponentActivity
import androidx.activity.compose.setContent
import androidx.compose.foundation.Canvas
import androidx.compose.foundation.layout.Arrangement
import androidx.compose.foundation.layout.Column
import androidx.compose.foundation.layout.fillMaxSize
import androidx.compose.foundation.layout.size
import androidx.compose.material.*
import androidx.compose.runtime.Composable
import androidx.compose.ui.Alignment
import androidx.compose.ui.Modifier
import androidx.compose.ui.graphics.Color
import androidx.compose.ui.graphics.drawscope.drawIntoCanvas
import androidx.compose.ui.graphics.nativeCanvas
import androidx.compose.ui.tooling.preview.Preview
import androidx.compose.ui.unit.dp
import androidx.compose.ui.unit.sp

class MainActivity : ComponentActivity() {
    override fun onCreate(savedInstanceState: Bundle?) {
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState)
        setContent {
            // Calling the composable function
            // to display element and its contents
            MainContent()
        }
    }
}

// Creating a composable
// function to display Top Bar
@Composable
fun MainContent() {
    Scaffold(
        topBar = { TopAppBar(title = { Text("GFG | Curved Text", color = Color.White) }, backgroundColor = Color(0xff0f9d58)) },
        content = { MyContent() }
    )
}

// Creating a composable function to
// create a canvas to draw curved text
// Calling this function as content
// in the above function
@Composable
fun MyContent(){

    Column(Modifier.fillMaxSize(), horizontalAlignment = Alignment.CenterHorizontally, verticalArrangement = Arrangement.Center) {

        // Creating a canvas with various attributes
        Canvas(modifier = Modifier.size(300.dp)) {
            drawIntoCanvas {
                val textPadding = 30.dp.toPx()
                val arcHeight = 300.dp.toPx()
                val arcWidth = 300.dp.toPx()

                // Path for curved text
                val path = Path().apply {
                    addArc(0f, textPadding, arcWidth, arcHeight, 180f, 180f)
                }
                it.nativeCanvas.drawTextOnPath(
                    "Hello Geek! This is Curved Text.",
                    path,
                    0f,
                    0f,
                    Paint().apply {
                        textSize = 20.sp.toPx()
                        textAlign = Paint.Align.CENTER
                    }
                )
            }
        }
    }
}

// For displaying preview in
// the Android Studio IDE emulator
@Preview(showBackground = true)
@Composable
fun DefaultPreview() {
    MainContent()
}

Output:

In the below screenshot of the application, you can see that the text that we entered inside the program has followed a curved path.