Download the appropriate NDK package for your platform and follow the installation instructions. This saves some time because of the smaller download size (<.5 GB) but will need some setting up. The second way is to download the NDK manually from the NDK Downloads page. This is a large download (~1GB) so be sure to have a good internet connection and/or patience. The first and easiest is the automatic installation option in the SDK Tools tab. NDK PackageĪndroid Studio only includes the default tools and SDK, so download and install the NDK package separately. If you don’t have it already, download Android Studio, the official IDE from Google. You should never base your decision on your preferred language even if you are an expert in C or C++. Make sure to balance the pros and cons of using the NDK before deciding if it’s worth the extra complexity. This means you can leverage a large collection of native code libraries available online. Another good use case is reusing existing libraries written in C/C++. This includes computationally intensive apps like games, game engines, signal processing and physics simulations. The previous statements may sound discouraging but there are good use cases for the NDK.

What the NDK guarantees is an increase in app complexity and connectivity from interfacing with native code. Using the NDK is generally not recommended because apps may experience a performance hit, suffer from compatibility issues, be harder to debug, and reduce flexibility. The NDK is a toolset that enables the development of Android apps using C, C++ and other native code languages, compiling code into applications that can run on Android devices.

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