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Shorebird

Create a Release

In order to start pushing updates, you will need to create a release.

Creating a release builds and submits your app to Shorebird. Shorebird saves the compiled Dart code from your application in order to make updates smaller in size.

Create an Android release by running the following command:

shorebird release android

Example output:

Terminal window
$ shorebird release android
✓ Building release (9.6s)
✓ Fetching apps (0.2s)
✓ Detecting release version (0.2s)
✓ Fetching releases (68ms)


🚀 Ready to create a new release!


📱 App: new_flutter_app (7a29188a-9363-426a-9a36-74a5e166373d)
📦 Release Version: 1.0.0+1
🕹️  Platform: android (arm64, arm32, x86_64)


Would you like to continue? (y/N) Yes
✓ Fetching Flutter revision (30ms)
✓ Updating release status (67ms)
✓ Creating artifacts (2.8s)
✓ Updating release status (62ms)


✅ Published Release!


Your next step is to upload the app bundle to the Play Store.
build/app/outputs/bundle/release/app-release.aab


See the following link for more information:
https://support.google.com/googleplay/android-developer/answer/9859152?hl=en

If your application supports flavors or multiple release targets, you can specify the flavor and target using the --flavor and --target options:

Terminal window
shorebird release android --target ./lib/main_development.dart --flavor development

shorebird release wraps flutter build and can take any argument flutter build can. To pass arguments to the underlying flutter build you need to put flutter build arguments after a -- separator. For example: shorebird release android -- --dart-define="foo=bar" will define the "foo" environment variable inside Dart as you might have done with flutter build directly.

By default, shorebird release android builds an AppBundle (.aab). If you would like to also generate an Android Package Kit (.apk), use the following command:

shorebird release android --artifact apk

By default shorebird release uses the Flutter version bundled within the shorebird installation.

That version can be checked by running shorebird doctor

To release with a different Flutter version, you can specify the version using the --flutter-version flag.

shorebird release android --flutter-version 3.19.0

Manage Releases

List Releases

You can view all of your releases for your current app (as defined by your shorebird.yaml) on the Shorebird console.

Delete Releases

Deleting a release will remove all associated patches and artifacts and is not reversible.

You can delete a release for your current app (as defined by your shorebird.yaml) on the Shorebird console.

Side-loading and MDM

A common question we get asked is: Does Shorebird require publishing to the App Store or Play Store?

No. Shorebird works fine with side-loading and mobile device management (MDM) on Android. We’ve not had anyone try Shorebird with iOS Developer Enterprise program, but we expect it to work just as well.

To build Shorebird for distribution via APK (e.g. side-loading), use the --artifact flag with the shorebird release command. For example:

Terminal window
shorebird release android --artifact=apk

That will produce both .apk and .aab files. You can distribute either or both as needed.