Adding WebView to your Flutter app

1. Introduction

Last Updated: 2021-10-19

With the WebView Flutter plugin you can add a WebView widget to your Android or iOS Flutter app. On iOS the WebView widget is backed by a WKWebView, while on Android the WebView widget is backed by a WebView. The plugin can render Flutter widgets over the web view. So for example it's possible to render a drop down menu over the web view.

What you'll build

In this codelab, you'll build a mobile app step by step featuring a WebView using the Flutter SDK. Your app will:

Display web content in a WebView
Display Flutter widgets stacked over the WebView
React to page load progress events
Control the WebView through the WebViewController
Block websites using the NavigationDelegate
Evaluate JavaScript expressions
Handle callbacks from JavaScript with JavascriptChannels
Set, remove, add or show cookies
Load and display HTML from assets, files or Strings containing HTML

What you'll learn

In this codelab you'll learn how to use the webview_flutter plugin in a variety of ways, including:

How to configure the webview_flutter plugin
How to listen for page load progress events
How to control page navigation
How to command the WebView to go backwards and forwards through its history
How to evaluate JavaScript, including using returned results
How to register callbacks to call Dart code from JavaScript
How to manage cookies
How to load and display HTML pages from assets or files or String containing HTML

What you'll need

Android Studio 4.1 or later (for Android development)
Xcode 12 or later (for iOS development)
Flutter SDK
A code editor, such as Android Studio, Visual Studio Code, or Emacs.

2. Set up your Flutter development environment

You need two pieces of software to complete this lab—the Flutter SDK and an editor.

You can run the codelab using any of these devices:

A physical Android or iOS device connected to your computer and set to Developer mode.
The iOS simulator (requires installing Xcode tools).
The Android Emulator (requires setup in Android Studio).

3. Getting started

Getting started with Flutter

There are a variety of ways of creating a new Flutter project, with both Android Studio and Visual Studio Code providing tooling for this task. Either follow the linked procedures to create a project, or execute the following commands in a handy command line terminal.

$ flutter create --platforms=android,ios webview_in_flutter
Creating project webview_in_flutter...
Running "flutter pub get" in webview_in_flutter...               1,728ms
Wrote 73 files.

All done!
In order to run your application, type:

  $ cd webview_in_flutter
  $ flutter run

Your application code is in webview_in_flutter/lib/main.dart.

Adding WebView Flutter plugin as a dependency

Adding additional capability to a Flutter app is easy using Pub packages. In this codelab you will add the webview_flutter plugin to your project. Run the following commands in the terminal.

$ cd webview_in_flutter
$ flutter pub add webview_flutter

If you inspect your pubspec.yaml, you will now see it has a line in the dependencies section for the webview_flutter plugin.

Configure Android minSDK

To use the webview_flutter plugin on Android you need to set the minSDK to 20. Modify your android/app/build.gradle file as follows:

android/app/build.gradle

android {
    //...

    defaultConfig {
        applicationId "com.example.webview_in_flutter"
        minSdkVersion 20                           // MODIFY
        targetSdkVersion flutter.targetSdkVersion
        versionCode flutterVersionCode.toInteger()
        versionName flutterVersionName
    }

4. Adding WebView widget to the Flutter App

In this step you will add a WebView to your application. WebViews are hosted native views, and you as an app developer have a choice on how to host these native views in your app. On Android you have a choice between Virtual Displays, currently the default for Android, and Hybrid composition. However, iOS always uses Hybrid composition.

For an in depth discussion of the differences between Virtual Displays and Hybrid composition, please read through the documentation on Hosting native Android and iOS views in your Flutter app with Platform Views.

Putting a Webview on the screen

Replace the content of lib/main.dart with the following:

lib/main.dart

import 'package:flutter/material.dart';
import 'package:webview_flutter/webview_flutter.dart';

void main() {
  runApp(
    const MaterialApp(
      theme: ThemeData(useMaterial3: true),
      home: WebViewApp(),
    ),
  );
}

class WebViewApp extends StatefulWidget {
  const WebViewApp({super.key});

  @override
  State<WebViewApp> createState() => _WebViewAppState();
}

class _WebViewAppState extends State<WebViewApp> {
  late final WebViewController controller;

  @override
  void initState() {
    super.initState();
    controller = WebViewController()
      ..loadRequest(
        Uri.parse('https://flutter.dev'),
      );
  }

  @override
  Widget build(BuildContext context) {
    return Scaffold(
      appBar: AppBar(
        title: const Text('Flutter WebView'),
      ),
      body: WebViewWidget(
        controller: controller,
      ),
    );
  }
}

Running this on iOS or Android will show a WebView as a full bleed browser window on your device, which means that the browser is shown on your device in fullscreen without any form of border or margin. As you scroll, you will notice parts of the page that might look a bit odd. This is because JavaScript is currently disabled and rendering flutter.dev properly requires JavaScript.

Running the app

Run the Flutter app in either iOS or Android to see a Webview, which displays the flutter.dev website. Alternatively run the app in either an Android emulator or an iOS simulator. Feel free to replace the initial WebView URL with for example your own website.

$ flutter run

Assuming that you have the appropriate simulator or emulator running, or a physical device attached, after compiling and deploying the app to your device, you should see something like the following:

5. Listening for page load events

The WebView widget provides several page load progress events, which your app can listen to. During the WebView page load cycle there are three different page load events that are fired: onPageStarted, onProgress, and onPageFinished. In this step you will implement a page load indicator. As a bonus, this will show that you can render Flutter content over the WebView content area.

Adding page load events to your app

Create a new source file at lib/src/web_view_stack.dart and fill it with the following content:

lib/src/web_view_stack.dart

import 'package:flutter/material.dart';
import 'package:webview_flutter/webview_flutter.dart';

class WebViewStack extends StatefulWidget {
  const WebViewStack({super.key});

  @override
  State<WebViewStack> createState() => _WebViewStackState();
}

class _WebViewStackState extends State<WebViewStack> {
  var loadingPercentage = 0;
  late final WebViewController controller;

  @override
  void initState() {
    super.initState();
    controller = WebViewController()
      ..setNavigationDelegate(NavigationDelegate(
        onPageStarted: (url) {
          setState(() {
            loadingPercentage = 0;
          });
        },
        onProgress: (progress) {
          setState(() {
            loadingPercentage = progress;
          });
        },
        onPageFinished: (url) {
          setState(() {
            loadingPercentage = 100;
          });
        },
      ))
      ..loadRequest(
        Uri.parse('https://flutter.dev'),
      );
  }

  @override
  Widget build(BuildContext context) {
    return Stack(
      children: [
        WebViewWidget(
          controller: controller,
        ),
        if (loadingPercentage < 100)
          LinearProgressIndicator(
            value: loadingPercentage / 100.0,
          ),
      ],
    );
  }
}

This code has wrapped the WebView widget in a Stack, conditionally overlaying the WebView with a LinearProgressIndicator when the page load percentage is less than 100%. As this involves program state that changes over time, you have stored this state in a State class associated with a StatefulWidget.

To make use of this new WebViewStack widget, modify your lib/main.dart as follows:

lib/main.dart

import 'package:flutter/material.dart';

import 'src/web_view_stack.dart';

void main() {
  runApp(
    const MaterialApp(
      theme: ThemeData(useMaterial3: true),
      home: WebViewApp(),
    ),
  );
}

class WebViewApp extends StatefulWidget {
  const WebViewApp({super.key});

  @override
  State<WebViewApp> createState() => _WebViewAppState();
}

class _WebViewAppState extends State<WebViewApp> {
  @override
  Widget build(BuildContext context) {
    return Scaffold(
      appBar: AppBar(
        title: const Text('Flutter WebView'),
      ),
      body: const WebViewStack(),
    );
  }
}

When you run the app, depending on your network conditions, and whether the browser has cached the page you are navigating to, you will see a page loading indicator overlaid on top of the WebView content area.

6. Working with the WebViewController

The WebView widget enables programmatic control with a WebViewController. This controller is made available after the construction of the WebView widget through a callback. The asynchronous nature of the availability of this controller makes it a prime candidate for Dart's asynchronous Completer<T> class.

Update lib/src/web_view_stack.dart as follows:

lib/src/web_view_stack.dart

import 'package:flutter/material.dart';
import 'package:webview_flutter/webview_flutter.dart';

class WebViewStack extends StatefulWidget {
  const WebViewStack({required this.controller, super.key}); // MODIFY

  final WebViewController controller;                        // ADD

  @override
  State<WebViewStack> createState() => _WebViewStackState();
}

class _WebViewStackState extends State<WebViewStack> {
  var loadingPercentage = 0;
  // REMOVE the controller that was here

  @override
  void initState() {
    super.initState();
    // Modify from here...
    widget.controller.setNavigationDelegate(
      NavigationDelegate(
        onPageStarted: (url) {
          setState(() {
            loadingPercentage = 0;
          });
        },
        onProgress: (progress) {
          setState(() {
            loadingPercentage = progress;
          });
        },
        onPageFinished: (url) {
          setState(() {
            loadingPercentage = 100;
          });
        },
      ),
    );
    // ...to here.
  }

  @override
  Widget build(BuildContext context) {
    return Stack(
      children: [
        WebViewWidget(
          controller: widget.controller,                     // MODIFY
        ),
        if (loadingPercentage < 100)
          LinearProgressIndicator(
            value: loadingPercentage / 100.0,
          ),
      ],
    );
  }
}

The WebViewStack widget now uses a controller created in the surrounding widget. This will enable the controller for the WebViewWidget to be shared with other parts of the app easily.

Having a working WebView is one thing, but being able to navigate backwards and forwards through the page history, and reload the page, would be a useful set of additions. Thankfully, with a WebViewController you can add this functionality to your app.

Create a new source file at lib/src/navigation_controls.dart and fill it with the following:

lib/src/navigation_controls.dart

import 'package:flutter/material.dart';
import 'package:webview_flutter/webview_flutter.dart';

class NavigationControls extends StatelessWidget {
  const NavigationControls({required this.controller, super.key});

  final WebViewController controller;

  @override
  Widget build(BuildContext context) {
    return Row(
      children: <Widget>[
        IconButton(
          icon: const Icon(Icons.arrow_back_ios),
          onPressed: () async {
            final messenger = ScaffoldMessenger.of(context);
            if (await controller.canGoBack()) {
              await controller.goBack();
            } else {
              messenger.showSnackBar(
                const SnackBar(content: Text('No back history item')),
              );
              return;
            }
          },
        ),
        IconButton(
          icon: const Icon(Icons.arrow_forward_ios),
          onPressed: () async {
            final messenger = ScaffoldMessenger.of(context);
            if (await controller.canGoForward()) {
              await controller.goForward();
            } else {
              messenger.showSnackBar(
                const SnackBar(content: Text('No forward history item')),
              );
              return;
            }
          },
        ),
        IconButton(
          icon: const Icon(Icons.replay),
          onPressed: () {
            controller.reload();
          },
        ),
      ],
    );
  }
}

This widget uses the WebViewController shared with it at construction time to enable the user control the WebView through a series of IconButtons.

With the updated WebViewStack, and the newly crafted NavigationControls in hand, it is now time for you to put it all together in an updated WebViewApp. This is where we construct the shared WebViewController. With WebViewApp near the top of the Widget tree in this app, it makes sense to create it at this level.

Update lib/main.dart file as follows:

lib/main.dart

import 'package:flutter/material.dart';
import 'package:webview_flutter/webview_flutter.dart';  // ADD

import 'src/navigation_controls.dart';                  // ADD
import 'src/web_view_stack.dart';

void main() {
  runApp(
    const MaterialApp(
      theme: ThemeData(useMaterial3: true),
      home: WebViewApp(),
    ),
  );
}

class WebViewApp extends StatefulWidget {
  const WebViewApp({super.key});

  @override
  State<WebViewApp> createState() => _WebViewAppState();
}

class _WebViewAppState extends State<WebViewApp> {
  // Add from here...
  late final WebViewController controller;

  @override
  void initState() {
    super.initState();
    controller = WebViewController()
      ..loadRequest(
        Uri.parse('https://flutter.dev'),
      );
  }
  // ...to here.

  @override
  Widget build(BuildContext context) {
    return Scaffold(
      appBar: AppBar(
        title: const Text('Flutter WebView'),
        // Add from here...
        actions: [
          NavigationControls(controller: controller),
        ],
        // ...to here.
      ),
      body: WebViewStack(controller: controller),       // MODIFY
    );
  }
}

Running the app should reveal a web page with controls:

7. Keeping track of navigation with the NavigationDelegate

WebView provides your app with a NavigationDelegate, which enables your app to track and control the page navigation of the WebView widget. When a navigation is initiated by the WebView, for example when a user clicks on a link, the NavigationDelegate is called. The NavigationDelegate callback can be used to control whether the WebView proceeds with the navigation.

Register a custom NavigationDelegate

In this step, you will register a NavigationDelegate callback to block navigation to YouTube.com. Note, this simplistic implementation also blocks inline YouTube content, which appears in various Flutter API documentation pages.

Update the lib/src/web_view_stack.dart as follows:

lib/src/web_view_stack.dart

import 'package:flutter/material.dart';
import 'package:webview_flutter/webview_flutter.dart';

class WebViewStack extends StatefulWidget {
  const WebViewStack({required this.controller, super.key});

  final WebViewController controller;

  @override
  State<WebViewStack> createState() => _WebViewStackState();
}

class _WebViewStackState extends State<WebViewStack> {
  var loadingPercentage = 0;

  @override
  void initState() {
    super.initState();
    widget.controller.setNavigationDelegate(
      NavigationDelegate(
        onPageStarted: (url) {
          setState(() {
            loadingPercentage = 0;
          });
        },
        onProgress: (progress) {
          setState(() {
            loadingPercentage = progress;
          });
        },
        onPageFinished: (url) {
          setState(() {
            loadingPercentage = 100;
          });
        },
        // Add from here...
        onNavigationRequest: (navigation) {
          final host = Uri.parse(navigation.url).host;
          if (host.contains('youtube.com')) {
            ScaffoldMessenger.of(context).showSnackBar(
              SnackBar(
                content: Text(
                  'Blocking navigation to $host',
                ),
              ),
            );
            return NavigationDecision.prevent;
          }
          return NavigationDecision.navigate;
        },
        // ...to here.
      ),
    );
  }

  @override
  Widget build(BuildContext context) {
    return Stack(
      children: [
        WebViewWidget(
          controller: widget.controller,
        ),
        if (loadingPercentage < 100)
          LinearProgressIndicator(
            value: loadingPercentage / 100.0,
          ),
      ],
    );
  }
}

In the next step, you will add a menu item to enable testing your NavigationDelegate by using the WebViewController class. It is left as an exercise to the reader to augment the logic of the callback to only block full page navigation to YouTube.com, and still allow the inline YouTube content in the API documentation.

8. Adding a menu button to the AppBar

Over the next few steps, you will craft a menu button in the AppBar widget that is used to evaluate JavaScript, invoke JavaScript channels, and manage cookies. All in all, a useful menu indeed.

Create a new source file at lib/src/menu.dart and fill it with the following:

lib/src/menu.dart

import 'package:flutter/material.dart';
import 'package:webview_flutter/webview_flutter.dart';

enum _MenuOptions {
  navigationDelegate,
}

class Menu extends StatelessWidget {
  const Menu({required this.controller, super.key});

  final WebViewController controller;

  @override
  Widget build(BuildContext context) {
    return PopupMenuButton<_MenuOptions>(
      onSelected: (value) async {
        switch (value) {
          case _MenuOptions.navigationDelegate:
            await controller.loadRequest(Uri.parse('https://youtube.com'));
            break;
        }
      },
      itemBuilder: (context) => [
        const PopupMenuItem<_MenuOptions>(
          value: _MenuOptions.navigationDelegate,
          child: Text('Navigate to YouTube'),
        ),
      ],
    );
  }
}

When the user selects the Navigate to YouTube menu option, the WebViewController's loadRequest method is executed. This navigation will be blocked by the navigationDelegate callback you created in the previous step.

To add the menu to the WebViewApp's screen, modify lib/main.dart as follows:

lib/main.dart

import 'package:flutter/material.dart';
import 'package:webview_flutter/webview_flutter.dart';

import 'src/menu.dart';                               // ADD
import 'src/navigation_controls.dart';
import 'src/web_view_stack.dart';

void main() {
  runApp(
    const MaterialApp(
      theme: ThemeData(useMaterial3: true),
      home: WebViewApp(),
    ),
  );
}

class WebViewApp extends StatefulWidget {
  const WebViewApp({super.key});

  @override
  State<WebViewApp> createState() => _WebViewAppState();
}

class _WebViewAppState extends State<WebViewApp> {
  late final WebViewController controller;

  @override
  void initState() {
    super.initState();
    controller = WebViewController()
      ..loadRequest(
        Uri.parse('https://flutter.dev'),
      );
  }

  @override
  Widget build(BuildContext context) {
    return Scaffold(
      appBar: AppBar(
        title: const Text('Flutter WebView'),
        actions: [
          NavigationControls(controller: controller),
          Menu(controller: controller),               // ADD
        ],
      ),
      body: WebViewStack(controller: controller),
    );
  }
}

Run your app and tap on the Navigate to YouTube menu item. You should be greeted with a SnackBar informing you that the navigation controller blocked navigating to YouTube.

9. Evaluating JavaScript

The WebViewController can evaluate JavaScript expressions in the context of the current page. There are two different ways to evaluate JavaScript: for JavaScript code that doesn't return a value, use runJavaScript, and for JavaScript code that does return a value, use runJavaScriptReturningResult.

To enable JavaScript, you need to configure the WebViewController with the javaScriptMode property set to JavascriptMode.unrestricted. By default, javascriptMode is set to JavascriptMode.disabled.

Update the _WebViewStackState class by adding the javascriptMode setting as follows:

lib/src/web_view_stack.dart

class _WebViewStackState extends State<WebViewStack> {
  var loadingPercentage = 0;

  @override
  void initState() {
    super.initState();
    widget.controller
      ..setNavigationDelegate(
        NavigationDelegate(
          onPageStarted: (url) {
            setState(() {
              loadingPercentage = 0;
            });
          },
          onProgress: (progress) {
            setState(() {
              loadingPercentage = progress;
            });
          },
          onPageFinished: (url) {
            setState(() {
              loadingPercentage = 100;
            });
          },
          onNavigationRequest: (navigation) {
            final host = Uri.parse(navigation.url).host;
            if (host.contains('youtube.com')) {
              ScaffoldMessenger.of(context).showSnackBar(
                SnackBar(
                  content: Text(
                    'Blocking navigation to $host',
                  ),
                ),
              );
              return NavigationDecision.prevent;
            }
            return NavigationDecision.navigate;
          },
        ),
      )
      ..setJavaScriptMode(JavaScriptMode.unrestricted);
  }

  @override
  Widget build(BuildContext context) {
    return Stack(
      children: [
        WebViewWidget(
          controller: widget.controller,
        ),
        if (loadingPercentage < 100)
          LinearProgressIndicator(
            value: loadingPercentage / 100.0,
          ),
      ],
    );
  }
}

Now that the WebViewWidget can execute JavaScript, you can add an option to the menu to use the runJavaScriptReturningResult method.

Using either your Editor or some keyboard work, convert the Menu class to a StatefulWidget. Modify lib/src/menu.dart to match the following:

lib/src/menu.dart

import 'package:flutter/material.dart';
import 'package:webview_flutter/webview_flutter.dart';

enum _MenuOptions {
  navigationDelegate,
  userAgent,
}

class Menu extends StatefulWidget {
  const Menu({required this.controller, super.key});

  final WebViewController controller;

  @override
  State<Menu> createState() => _MenuState();
}

class _MenuState extends State<Menu> {
  @override
  Widget build(BuildContext context) {
    return PopupMenuButton<_MenuOptions>(
      onSelected: (value) async {
        switch (value) {
          case _MenuOptions.navigationDelegate:
            await widget.controller
                .loadRequest(Uri.parse('https://youtube.com'));
            break;
          case _MenuOptions.userAgent:
            final userAgent = await widget.controller
                .runJavaScriptReturningResult('navigator.userAgent');
            if (!mounted) return;
            ScaffoldMessenger.of(context).showSnackBar(SnackBar(
              content: Text('$userAgent'),
            ));
            break;
        }
      },
      itemBuilder: (context) => [
        const PopupMenuItem<_MenuOptions>(
          value: _MenuOptions.navigationDelegate,
          child: Text('Navigate to YouTube'),
        ),
        const PopupMenuItem<_MenuOptions>(
          value: _MenuOptions.userAgent,
          child: Text('Show user-agent'),
        ),
      ],
    );
  }
}

When you tap on the ‘Show user-agent' menu option, the result of executing the JavaScript expression navigator.userAgent is shown in a Snackbar. When running the app, you might notice that the Flutter.dev page looks different. This is the result of running with JavaScript enabled.

10. Working with JavaScript Channels

Javascript Channels enable your app to register callback handlers in the WebViewWidget's JavaScript context that can be invoked to convey values back to the App's Dart code. In this step you will register a SnackBar channel that will be called with the result of a XMLHttpRequest.

Update the WebViewStack class as follows:

lib/src/web_view_stack.dart

class WebViewStack extends StatefulWidget {
  const WebViewStack({required this.controller, super.key});

  final WebViewController controller;

  @override
  State<WebViewStack> createState() => _WebViewStackState();
}

class _WebViewStackState extends State<WebViewStack> {
  var loadingPercentage = 0;

  @override
  void initState() {
    super.initState();
    widget.controller
      ..setNavigationDelegate(
        NavigationDelegate(
          onPageStarted: (url) {
            setState(() {
              loadingPercentage = 0;
            });
          },
          onProgress: (progress) {
            setState(() {
              loadingPercentage = progress;
            });
          },
          onPageFinished: (url) {
            setState(() {
              loadingPercentage = 100;
            });
          },
          onNavigationRequest: (navigation) {
            final host = Uri.parse(navigation.url).host;
            if (host.contains('youtube.com')) {
              ScaffoldMessenger.of(context).showSnackBar(
                SnackBar(
                  content: Text(
                    'Blocking navigation to $host',
                  ),
                ),
              );
              return NavigationDecision.prevent;
            }
            return NavigationDecision.navigate;
          },
        ),
      )
      // Modify from here...
      ..setJavaScriptMode(JavaScriptMode.unrestricted)
      ..addJavaScriptChannel(
        'SnackBar',
        onMessageReceived: (message) {
          ScaffoldMessenger.of(context)
              .showSnackBar(SnackBar(content: Text(message.message)));
        },
      );
      // ...to here.
  }

  @override
  Widget build(BuildContext context) {
    return Stack(
      children: [
        WebViewWidget(
          controller: widget.controller,
        ),
        if (loadingPercentage < 100)
          LinearProgressIndicator(
            value: loadingPercentage / 100.0,
          ),
      ],
    );
  }
}

For each JavaScript Channel in the Set, a channel object is made available in the JavaScript context as a window property named with the same name as the JavaScript Channel name. Using this from the JavaScript context involves calling postMessage on the JavaScript Channel to send a message that is passed to the named JavascriptChannel's onMessageReceived callback handler.

To make use of the Javascript Channel added above, add another menu item that executes an XMLHttpRequest in the JavaScript context and passes back the results using the SnackBar JavaScript Channel.

Now that WebViewWidget knows about our JavaScript Channels,you will add an example to expand the app further. To do this, add an extra PopupMenuItem to the Menu class and add the extra functionality.

Update _MenuOptions with the extra menu option, by adding the javascriptChannel enumeration value, and add an implementation to the Menu class as follows:

lib/src/menu.dart

enum _MenuOptions {
  navigationDelegate,
  userAgent,
  javascriptChannel,
}

class Menu extends StatefulWidget {
  const Menu({required this.controller, super.key});

  final WebViewController controller;

  @override
  State<Menu> createState() => _MenuState();
}

class _MenuState extends State<Menu> {
  @override
  Widget build(BuildContext context) {
    return PopupMenuButton<_MenuOptions>(
      onSelected: (value) async {
        switch (value) {
          case _MenuOptions.navigationDelegate:
            await widget.controller
                .loadRequest(Uri.parse('https://youtube.com'));
            break;
          case _MenuOptions.userAgent:
            final userAgent = await widget.controller
                .runJavaScriptReturningResult('navigator.userAgent');
            if (!mounted) return;
            ScaffoldMessenger.of(context).showSnackBar(SnackBar(
              content: Text('$userAgent'),
            ));
            break;
          case _MenuOptions.javascriptChannel:
            await widget.controller.runJavaScript('''
var req = new XMLHttpRequest();
req.open('GET', "https://api.ipify.org/?format=json");
req.onload = function() {
  if (req.status == 200) {
    let response = JSON.parse(req.responseText);
    SnackBar.postMessage("IP Address: " + response.ip);
  } else {
    SnackBar.postMessage("Error: " + req.status);
  }
}
req.send();''');
            break;
        }
      },
      itemBuilder: (context) => [
        const PopupMenuItem<_MenuOptions>(
          value: _MenuOptions.navigationDelegate,
          child: Text('Navigate to YouTube'),
        ),
        const PopupMenuItem<_MenuOptions>(
          value: _MenuOptions.userAgent,
          child: Text('Show user-agent'),
        ),
        const PopupMenuItem<_MenuOptions>(
          value: _MenuOptions.javascriptChannel,
          child: Text('Lookup IP Address'),
        ),
      ],
    );
  }
}

This JavaScript is executed when the user chooses the JavaScript Channel Example menu option.

var req = new XMLHttpRequest();
req.open('GET', "https://api.ipify.org/?format=json");
req.onload = function() {
  if (req.status == 200) {
    SnackBar.postMessage(req.responseText);
  } else {
    SnackBar.postMessage("Error: " + req.status);
  }
}
req.send();

This code sends a GET request to a Public IP Address API, returning the device's IP address. This result is shown in a SnackBar by invoking postMessage on the SnackBar JavascriptChannel.

11. Managing Cookies

Your app can manage cookies in the WebView by using the CookieManager class. In this step, you are going to show a list of cookies, clear the list of cookies, delete cookies, and set new cookies. Add entries to the _MenuOptions for each of the cookie use cases as follows:

lib/src/menu.dart

enum _MenuOptions {
  navigationDelegate,
  userAgent,
  javascriptChannel,
  // Add from here ...
  listCookies,
  clearCookies,
  addCookie,
  setCookie,
  removeCookie,
  // ... to here.
}

The rest of the changes in this step are focused on the Menu class, including the conversion of the Menu class from stateless to stateful. This change is important because the Menu needs to own the CookieManager, and mutable state in stateless widgets is a bad combination.

Add the CookieManager to the resulting State class as follows:

lib/src/menu.dart

class Menu extends StatefulWidget {
  const Menu({required this.controller, super.key});

  final WebViewController controller;

  @override
  State<Menu> createState() => _MenuState();
}

class _MenuState extends State<Menu> {
  final cookieManager = WebViewCookieManager();       // Add this line

  @override
  Widget build(BuildContext context) {
  // ...

The _MenuState class will contain the code previously added in the Menu class, along with the newly added CookieManager. In the next series of sections, you will add helper functions to _MenuState that will, in turn, be invoked by the yet to be added menu items.

Get a list of all cookies

You are going to use JavaScript to get a list of all the cookies. To achieve this, add a helper method to the end of _MenuState class, called _onListCookies. Using the runJavaScriptReturningResult method, your helper method executes document.cookie in the JavaScript context, returning a list of all cookies.