CODEWITHSUNDEEP
react-native
damusnet
damusnet

Reputation: 4398

When to use TouchableNativeFeedback, TouchableHighlight or TouchableOpacity?

In React Native, there are at least three ways to make a button: TouchableNativeFeedback, TouchableHighlight and TouchableOpacity. There is also TouchableWithoutFeedback, which the documentation clearly states you should not use because "all the elements that respond to press should have a visual feedback when touched".

Are there any other significant differences between the three? Is one of them the goto component? In what case should you use TouchableHighlight over TouchableOpacity? Are there any performance implications?

I am writing an application right now, and find that all three have a significant delay between tap and the action (in this case a navigation change). Is there any way to make it snappier?

Upvotes: 120

Views: 59689

Answers (4)

Edan Chetrit
Edan Chetrit

Reputation: 5081

source: https://medium.com/differential/better-cross-platform-react-native-components-cb8aadeba472, by Nick Wientge

TouchableHighlight

• What it does: Darkens or lightens the background of the element when pressed.

• When to use it: On iOS for touchable elements or buttons that have a solid shape or background, and on ListView items.

TouchableOpacity

• What it does: Lightens the opacity of the entire element when pressed.

• When to use it: On iOS for touchable elements that are standalone text or icons with no background color.

TouchableNativeFeedback

• What it does: Adds a ripple effect to the background when pressed.

• When to use it: On Android for almost all touchable elements.

Upvotes: 158

Mohamed Saleh
Mohamed Saleh

Reputation: 3287

I think the main essential difference as stated in Docs:

TouchableHighlight must have one child (not zero or more than one). If you wish to have several child components, wrap them in a View.link

TouchableHighlight

TouchableHighlight A wrapper for making views respond properly to touches. On press down, the opacity of the wrapped view is decreased, which allows the underlay color to show through, darkening or tinting the view.

The underlay comes from wrapping the child in a new View, which can affect layout, and sometimes cause unwanted visual artifacts if not used correctly, for example if the backgroundColor of the wrapped view isn't explicitly set to an opaque color.

TouchableOpacity

TouchableOpacity # A wrapper for making views respond properly to touches. On press down, the opacity of the wrapped view is decreased, dimming it.

Upvotes: 4

mienaikoe
mienaikoe

Reputation: 510

Well, This is how I typically decide what to use:

  • If I'm building for Android-only, and the component is large enough that the native feedback will be visibly different than using the others then I use TouchableNativeFeedback
  • If I want to control the opacity on the component or I want the button to have color when touched, and I don't want to control the focused state of some element inside the Touchable, then I use TouchableHighlight. (TouchableOpacity has got some weird parts when you control opacity yourself).
  • In all other cases, I use TouchableOpacity because it's more "bare" than TouchableHighlight

Upvotes: 13

stereodenis
stereodenis

Reputation: 3745

If you want to

  • highlight button on press — use TouchableHighlight
  • change button's opacity on press — use TouchableOpacity

Upvotes: -2

Related Questions