How to Add lottie animation in Android Studio Kotlin

In this guide tutorial, you’ll learn step-by-step how to Add lottie animation in Android Studio Kotlin. Animations make apps more interactive and engaging. Instead of creating complex animations manually, you can use Lottie, a library by Airbnb, that renders JSON-based animations exported from After Effects.

What is Lottie Animation in Android Studio Kotlin?

Lottie is an open-source library that parses Adobe After Effects animations exported as JSON and renders them natively on mobile and web.

Why use Lottie Animation In Kotlin?

Lightweight compared to GIFs
High quality, vector-based
Supports scaling without pixelation
Easy to use with Android Studio

Example Use Cases for Lottie Animation

Splash screen animation
Button click effects
Success/failure indicators
Loading screens

Step-by-Step Guide for Add lottie animation in Android Studio Kotlin

Step 1: Add Dependency in Kotlin Project

In your app/build.gradle file, add the Lottie library:

dependencies {
    implementation "com.airbnb.android:lottie:6.0.0"
}

Sync your project after adding it.

Step 2: Add Lottie Animation File

Download a Lottie JSON file . You can get free animations from: https://app.lottiefiles.com

And put the file in your Android project under: app/src/main/res/raw/animation.json

Step 3: Add Lottie Animation View in Layout

Open your XML layout file (e.g., activity_main.xml) and add:

<com.airbnb.lottie.LottieAnimationView
    android:id="@+id/lottieAnimation"
    android:layout_width="300dp"
    android:layout_height="300dp"
    app:lottie_rawRes="@raw/animation"
    app:lottie_autoPlay="true"
    app:lottie_loop="true"/>

lottie_rawRes → points to your animation file in res/raw/.
lottie_autoPlay="true" → starts animation automatically.
lottie_loop="true" → keeps looping.

Step 4: Control Lottie Animation in Kotlin Code

Inside your MainActivity.kt:

import androidx.appcompat.app.AppCompatActivity
import android.os.Bundle
import com.airbnb.lottie.LottieAnimationView

class MainActivity : AppCompatActivity() {
    override fun onCreate(savedInstanceState: Bundle?) {
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState)
        setContentView(R.layout.activity_main)

        val lottieAnimation = findViewById<LottieAnimationView>(R.id.lottieAnimation)

        // Start animation
        lottieAnimation.playAnimation()

        // Stop animation
        // lottieAnimation.cancelAnimation()

        // Play only once
        // lottieAnimation.repeatCount = 0
    }
}

Step 5: Customize Animation (Optional)

Change speed: lottieAnimation.speed = 2.0f // double speed lottieAnimation.speed = 0.5f // half speed
Play from specific frame: lottieAnimation.setMinAndMaxFrame(10, 50) lottieAnimation.playAnimation()

Final Output

Lottie animation in Android Studio kotlin Output

See Complete Tutorial on YouTube

Differences Between Lottie and GIF

Features	Lottie	GIF
File Size	Small	Large
Quality	Vector	Pixel-based
Performance	Smooth	Heavy
Control (Pause/Play)	✅ Yes	❌ No

Final Thoughts

Using Lottie in Android apps is an easy way to make your app look modern and professional without writing complex animation code. Start with simple animations like a loader or splash screen, and gradually explore interactive ones.

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