Android App Links – Iterable Support Center

Messages sent with Iterable can include Android App Links, which redirect users to your installed mobile app—no browser required. Iterable tracks clicks on these links as expected.

Android Setup

WARNING

You must set up iOS deep linking before implementing Android deep linking (they rely on similar architecture).

# Setting up Android App Links

# 1. Enable Android App Links

To enable Android App Links, follow these steps:

Configure your Iterable project to support deep links. For more information, read Configuring Deep Links for Email or SMS.
Configure your mobile app to handle Android App Links by following the instructions in the Android documentation.
Create intent filters for Iterable URIs by using the App Links Assistant
- Set the Host to your tracking domain. For example, https://links.<YOUR_TRACKING_DOMAIN>.com.
- Set the Path to use /a as the pathPrefix.
Generate the assetlinks.json file

# 2. Upload `assetlinks.json`

After you generate an assetlinks.json file with your app's fingerprint, you'll need to provide it to Iterable so that it can be hosted at <YOUR_TRACKING_DOMAIN>/.well-known/assetlinks.json. To upload it, follow the instructions in Configuring Deep Links for Email or SMS.

Then, use Google's Statement List Generator and Tester to test it out.

# 3. Determine which links to rewrite

To determine which links to rewrite as deep links for a given campaign, Iterable looks at the relevant tracking domain's apple-app-site-association file. Even if you only have an Android app, you'll still need to create this file. To learn how to do so, read Configuring Deep Links for Email or SMS.

# 4. Update your code

If you already have a urlHandler, you can use the same handler for email deep links by calling handleAppLink in the activity that handles all Android App Links in your app:

// MainActivity.java
@Override
public void onCreate() {
    super.onCreate();
    ...
    handleIntent(getIntent());
}

@Override
public void onNewIntent(Intent intent) {
    super.onNewIntent(intent);
    if (intent != null) {
        handleIntent(intent);
    }
}

private void handleIntent(Intent intent) {
    if (Intent.ACTION_VIEW.equals(intent.getAction()) && intent.getData() != null) {
        IterableApi.getInstance().handleAppLink(intent.getDataString());
        // Overwrite the intent to make sure we don't open the deep link
        // again when the user opens our app later from the task manager
        setIntent(new Intent(Intent.ACTION_MAIN));
    }
}

Alternatively, call getAndTrackDeeplink along with a callback to handle the original deep link URL. You can use this method for any incoming URLs, as it will execute the callback without changing the URL for non-Iterable URLs.

IterableApi.getAndTrackDeeplink(uri, new IterableHelper.IterableActionHandler() {
    @Override
    public void execute(String result) {
        Log.d("HandleDeeplink", "Redirected to: "+ result);
        // Handle the original deep link URL here
    }
});

TIP

To check if a URL is an Iterable deep link before handling it, use the isIterableDeepLink method:

if (IterableApi.getInstance().isIterableDeepLink(urlString)) {
    // URL is an Iterable deep link, handle it with the SDK
    IterableApi.getInstance().handleAppLink(urlString);
} else {
    // Handle non-Iterable URLs differently if needed
}

This method returns true if the URL matches the Iterable deep link pattern (URLs containing /a/ in the path).

# FAQ

For answers to common questions about deep links, read the Deep Link FAQs.

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