fold_adaptive_nav 1.2.0

Detects foldables and their posture on iOS and Android, and adapts navigation by itself: bottom bar on phones, thumb rail on cover displays, tablet layouts when open.

fold_adaptive_nav

Detects foldables and their posture natively on iOS (iPhone Duo) and Android, and switches your app's navigation by itself:

Device and posture	Tabs	Main action of a flow	Orientations
Ordinary phone	Floating bottom bar	Pinned to the bottom	Portrait
Foldable, closed (cover display)	Rail on the physical right, under the thumb	Thumb column on the right	Portrait (configurable)
Foldable, opened	Same as tablet	Same as tablet	All
Tablet	Bottom bar capped at 560 pt (or a rail)	Bottom, or a side panel from 840 pt	All

You add one widget and no device checks.

Screenshots

The example app on a closed and an opened foldable. Nothing in the app checks the device; the layout follows FoldScope.

Android (Pixel Fold)

Closed: cover display	Opened

iOS (iPhone Duo)

Closed: cover display	Opened

Setup

1. Add the package:

   flutter pub add fold_adaptive_nav
   

2. Wrap the app:

   void main() => runApp(
         FoldScope(
           config: const FoldAdaptiveConfig(
             coverRailSide: RailSide.trailingPhysicalRight,
             coverRailAlignment: CoverRailAlignment.bottom,
             tabletNavigation: TabletNavigation.bottomBar,
             coverOrientations: [DeviceOrientation.portraitUp],
             lockPhonesToPortrait: true,
           ),
           child: MaterialApp(home: const HomeShell()),
         ),
       );
   

   Don't call SystemChrome.setPreferredOrientations in main(). FoldScope sets orientations once the first fold reading arrives; locking portrait earlier pins an opened foldable until the stream catches up.

3. iOS

   • Build with Xcode 27.1 / the iOS 27.1 SDK. The SDK your app links against decides how much of the opened iPhone Duo it gets:

     App linked against	On the opened iPhone Duo
     iOS 26 SDK or earlier	Phone-sized window centred on the inner display
     iOS 27.0 SDK	Fills the display beside the status rail (about 80 pt short)
     iOS 27.1 SDK	Edge to edge, vertical bars, reserved regions

     Check a binary with otool -l Runner | grep -A4 LC_BUILD_VERSION (sdk 27.1).

   • In ios/Runner/Info.plist, the iPhone list UISupportedInterfaceOrientations (not only ~ipad) must contain all four orientations. Otherwise the opened Duo can't turn, whatever Dart asks. FoldScope locks ordinary phones back to portrait.

   • Optional, to get the horizontal status bar back on the cover display: in ios/Runner/Base.lproj/Main.storyboard, change the root controller to

     customClass="FoldFlutterViewController" customModule="fold_adaptive_nav_ios"
     

     Or, without touching the storyboard, set the Info.plist key FoldAdaptiveNavDisableVerticalBar to YES.

   • The plugin uses the UIScene lifecycle. Apps created with Flutter 3.38+ already have a SceneDelegate.

4. Android: the <activity> in AndroidManifest.xml needs android:resizeableActivity="true" and android:configChanges="orientation|keyboardHidden|keyboard|screenSize|smallestScreenSize|screenLayout|density|uiMode". Without smallestScreenSize|screenLayout, folding restarts the Flutter engine. The default template already has these.

5. After changing Info.plist, the storyboard, Swift, Kotlin or the manifest, stop the app and run it again. Hot reload and hot restart don't apply native changes, and on the iPhone Duo it then looks as if landscape doesn't work.

Tabs

AdaptiveNavScaffold(
  destinations: const [
    NavDestination(icon: Icons.home_outlined, selectedIcon: Icons.home, label: 'Home'),
    NavDestination(icon: Icons.search, label: 'Search'),
    NavDestination(icon: Icons.person_outline, label: 'Profile'),
  ],
  currentIndex: tab,
  onSelect: (i) => setState(() => tab = i),
  trailingAction: FloatingActionButton(onPressed: scan, child: const Icon(Icons.qr_code)),
  body: pages[tab],
)

trailingAction is a floating action button on phones and tablets, and sits at the foot of the rail on the cover display.

Where the tabs sit on the cover display

Two settings in FoldAdaptiveConfig pick the corner of the closed foldable:

	CoverRailAlignment.top	.center	.bottom (default)
RailSide.trailingPhysicalRight (default)	top right	middle right	bottom right
RailSide.physicalLeft	top left	middle left	bottom left

FoldScope(
  config: const FoldAdaptiveConfig(
    coverRailSide: RailSide.trailingPhysicalRight,
    coverRailAlignment: CoverRailAlignment.top, // tabs in the top-right corner
  ),
  child: ...,
)

The trailing action moves with the tabs. Bottom is the default because it's where the thumb rests.

Custom icons (SVG, PNG)

NavDestination.custom takes any widget as the icon. It is drawn in a 24 × 24 box, under an IconTheme with the selected or unselected color.

// PNG: ImageIcon picks up the tab's color by itself.
NavDestination.custom(
  icon: const ImageIcon(AssetImage('assets/home.png')),
  selectedIcon: const ImageIcon(AssetImage('assets/home_filled.png')),
  label: 'Home',
),

// SVG (flutter_svg): read the color from the IconTheme.
NavDestination.custom(
  icon: Builder(
    builder: (context) => SvgPicture.asset(
      'assets/search.svg',
      colorFilter: ColorFilter.mode(IconTheme.of(context).color!, BlendMode.srcIn),
    ),
  ),
  label: 'Search',
),

Leave out the colorFilter (or use Image.asset) to keep the image's own colors.

Badges and disabled tabs

NavDestination(icon: Icons.mail_outline, label: 'Inbox', badge: '3'), // '' = a dot
NavDestination(icon: Icons.lock_outline, label: 'Pro', enabled: false),

Styling

AdaptiveNavStyle styles the bottom bar, the cover rail and the tablet rail together. Every field is optional and falls back to Material 3. Set it for the whole app as a theme extension, or on one scaffold with style:, which wins field by field.

MaterialApp(
  theme: ThemeData(extensions: const [
    AdaptiveNavStyle(
      backgroundColor: Color(0xFF101418),
      indicatorColor: Color(0xFF2E7D6B),
      selectedColor: Colors.white,
      unselectedColor: Colors.white70,
      labelBehavior: NavLabelBehavior.onlySelected,
    ),
  ]),
  ...
)

AdaptiveNavScaffold(
  style: const AdaptiveNavStyle(
    barHeight: 72,
    barMargin: EdgeInsets.zero,          // edge to edge…
    barBorderRadius: BorderRadius.zero,  // …and flat
  ),
  ...
)

Field	Default
backgroundColor	surfaceContainer
indicatorColor, indicatorShape	secondaryContainer, stadium
selectedColor, unselectedColor	onSecondaryContainer, onSurfaceVariant
selectedLabelStyle, unselectedLabelStyle	merged over labelMedium
iconSize	24 (also the box for custom icons)
labelBehavior	NavLabelBehavior.alwaysShow
elevation, shadowColor	3, shadow (bottom bar)
barHeight, barBorderRadius, barMargin	68, 32, 12 at sides and bottom
railWidth	88 (cover rail)
railAlignment	follows coverRailAlignment; set it for other alignments such as spaceEvenly
animationDuration	200 ms on the cover rail

AdaptiveNavScaffold.backgroundColor sets the scaffold behind the body.

Flows

Scaffold(
  appBar: AppBar(title: const Text('Review')),
  body: PinnedActionBody(
    step: 3,
    stepCount: 3,
    footer: CheckboxListTile(...),        // too wide for the thumb column
    action: ActionGroup(children: [
      FlowActionButton.secondary(label: 'Edit', onPressed: back),
      FlowActionButton(label: 'Send', icon: Icons.check, onPressed: send),
    ]),
    child: ListView(...),
  ),
)

• FlowActionButton switches to a tall layout (icon over a label of up to three lines, at least 96 pt high) inside a ThumbColumnScope.
• ActionGroup lays buttons side by side, or stacks them in the thumb column.
• FlowProgress / FlowProgressColumn show the step and a row or column of dots.
• CoverActionRow is for screens that aren't scrolling forms.

Reading the state

context.formFactor;                       // FormFactor.phone / cover / tablet
FoldMediaQuery.postureOf(context);        // rebuilds on posture changes only
FoldMediaQuery.isFoldableOf(context);
FoldMediaQuery.regionsOf(context);        // fold and camera regions, logical px
FoldMediaQuery.horizontalSizeClassOf(context); // iOS
FoldPlatform.instance.hingeAngle;         // raw per-frame stream, for animations
FoldPlatform.instance.setVerticalSystemBarDisabled(true); // iOS 27.1+

FormFactorOverride(formFactor: FormFactor.cover, child: ...) pins the form factor of a subtree, for previews and tests.

Display features

By default FoldScope doesn't write the fold into MediaQuery.displayFeatures. If it did, Flutter would keep every dialog, sheet and menu to one half of the inner display. Opt in with FoldScope(bridge: DisplayFeatureBridge.cutoutsOnly) or .full. .full publishes the fold only while the device is partly open.

Testing

final states = StreamController<FoldState>(sync: true);
await tester.pumpWidget(FoldScope(debugState: states.stream, child: MaterialApp(...)));
states.add(const FoldState(isFoldable: true, posture: HingePosture.closed, ...));
await tester.pump();

Use StreamController(sync: true). Without it, each event lands a microtask after pump().

Packages

This is a federated plugin:

Package	Contents
fold_adaptive_nav	Widgets and the Dart API (this package)
fold_adaptive_nav_platform_interface	FoldState, the wire codec, FoldPlatform
fold_adaptive_nav_ios	Swift: UIHingeInteraction, reserved regions, size classes, vertical bar
fold_adaptive_nav_android	Kotlin: Jetpack WindowManager, hinge angle sensor

On web and desktop the state is FoldState.unsupported, and layout follows the window size alone.