Android – Using Intents to Open Files

Do you want to open from your code some mp3 or image file with the default media player/image viewing application? Use this:

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File videoFile2Play = new File("/sdcard/nice_movie.mpeg"); Intent i = new Intent(); i.setAction(android.content.Intent.ACTION_VIEW); i.setDataAndType(Uri.fromFile(videoFile2Play), "video/mpeg"); startActivity(i); File musicFile2Play = new File("/sdcard/some_file.mp3"); Intent i2 = new Intent(); i2.setAction(android.content.Intent.ACTION_VIEW); i2.setDataAndType(Uri.fromFile(musicFile2Play), "audio/mp3"); startActivity(i2);

If you want to open some other supported files with their own applications take a look at the table below to see the exact types you should use. If you don’t find in the table the file extension you want don’t worry, use the type String with the wild card character like this (and if your system supports that file it will be loaded by the appropriate application):

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File videoFile2Play2 = new File("/sdcard/nice_movie2.mp4"); i.setDataAndType(Uri.fromFile(videoFile2Play2), "video/*"); startActivity(i);

	Extension	MIME Type
Android Application	.apk	application/vnd.android.package-archive
Text	.txt	text/plain
	.csv	text/csv
	.xml	text/xml
Web related	.htm	text/html
	.html	text/html
	.php	text/php
Image	.png	image/png
	.gif	image/gif
	.jpg	image/jpg
	.jpeg	image/jpeg
	.bmp	image/bmp
Audio	.mp3	audio/mp3
	.wav	audio/wav
	.ogg	audio/x-ogg
	.mid	audio/mid
	.midi	audio/midi
	.amr	audio/AMR
Video	.mpeg	video/mpeg
	.3gp	video/3gpp
Package	.jar	application/java-archive
	.zip	application/zip
	.rar	application/x-rar-compressed
	.gz	application/gzip

For more info on MIME types and files handling based on their extension take a look at the MIMETypeMap documentation.