Expo

Documentation

Localization

You can use this module to Localize your app, and access the locale data on the native device. Using the popular library i18n-js with expo-localization will enable you to create a very accessible experience for users.

Platform Compatibility

Android DeviceAndroid EmulatoriOS DeviceiOS SimulatorWeb
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Installation

For managed apps, you'll need to run expo install expo-localization. To use it in a bare React Native app, follow its installation instructions.

Usage

import React from 'react';
import { Text } from 'react-native';
import * as Localization from 'expo-localization';
import i18n from 'i18n-js';
const en = {
  foo: 'Foo',
  bar: 'Bar {{someValue}}',
};
const fr = {
  foo: 'como telle fous',
  bar: 'chatouiller {{someValue}}',
};

i18n.fallbacks = true;
i18n.translations = { fr, en };
i18n.locale = Localization.locale;
export default class LitView extends React.Component {
  render() {
    return (
      <Text style={{ flex: 1, paddingTop: 50, alignSelf: 'center' }}>
        {i18n.t('foo')} {i18n.t('bar', { someValue: Date.now() })}
      </Text>
    );
  }
}

API

import * as Localization from 'expo-localization';

Constants

This API is mostly synchronous and driven by constants. On iOS the constants will always be correct, on Android you should check if the locale has updated using AppState and Localization.getLocalizationAsync(). Initally the constants will be correct on both platforms, but on Android a user can change the language and return, more on this later.

Localization.locale

Native device language, returned in standard format. Ex: en, en-US, es-US.

Localization.locales

List of all the native languages provided by the user settings. These are returned in the order the user defines in their native settings.

Localization.region

Available on iOS and Web. Region code for your device which came from Region setting in Language & Region. Ex: US, NZ.

Localization.isoCurrencyCodes

A list of all the supported ISO codes.

Localization.timezone

The current time zone in display format. ex: America/Los_Angeles
On Web timezone is calculated with Intl.DateTimeFormat().resolvedOptions().timeZone. For a better guess you could use the moment-timezone library but is a very large library and will add significant bloat to your bundle.

Localization.isRTL

This will return true if the current language is Right-to-Left.

Methods

Localization.getLocalizationAsync()

Android only, on iOS changing the locale settings will cause all the apps to reset.
type NativeEvent = {
  locale: string,
  locales: Array<string>,
  timezone: string,
  isoCurrencyCodes: ?Array<string>,
  region: ?string,
  isRTL: boolean,
};
Example
// When the app returns from the background on Android...

const { locale } = await Localization.getLocalizationAsync();