How to Develop and Package a Python Kivy App for Android and iOS Using Buildozer

Python is versatile but not ideal for app development; Kivy provides a cross‑platform Python framework for creating GUI apps on Linux, macOS, Windows, Android and iOS.

Environment setup

On macOS or Linux install the Kivy dependencies with Homebrew (or apt) and then install Cython and Kivy:

brew install pkg-config sdl2 sdl2_image sdl2_ttf sdl2_mixer gstreamer

pip install cython==0.25

pip install kivy

If the standard install fails, clone the source and install manually:

git clone https://github.com/kivy/kivy

python setup.py install

Test the installation by running python and importing Kivy; a successful import prints version information.

CentOS 7 installation

Install the required 32‑bit libraries and development packages:

yum install \

make \

mercurial \

automake \

gcc \

gcc-c++ \

SDL_ttf-devel \

SDL_mixer-devel \

khrplatform-devel \

mesa-libGLES \

mesa-libGLES-devel \

gstreamer-plugins-good \

gstreamer \

gstreamer-python \

mtdev-devel \

python-devel \

python-pip \

java-devel

Then install Cython and Kivy:

pip install Cython==0.20

pip install kivy

Building an APK with Buildozer

Install Buildozer:

pip install buildozer

Initialize the project and edit buildozer.spec as needed:

buildozer init

Build, debug, and deploy the Android package:

buildozer android debug deploy run

The first run downloads the Android SDK and other tools; the process may require a proxy.

Troubleshooting

Common errors include missing 32‑bit libraries (install them via yum -y install --skip-broken … ) and Cython compilation failures (use pip install cython==0.25 ). A bug copying the APK can be fixed by editing /usr/local/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/buildozer/targets/android.py and adjusting the build‑tool version logic.

Buildozer virtual machine

Kivy provides a pre‑configured Buildozer VM image that contains all dependencies, useful when local environments fail.

Overall, the article demonstrates a minimal “Hello, World” Kivy app, shows how to package it for Android, and provides practical tips for resolving typical build issues.