Android Starter App

This guide walks through the process of building a native Android Starter App that:

Connects to Plaud devices
Syncs recordings from Plaud device to mobile phone
Uploads recordings from your users’ mobile phone to Plaud’s file storage
Transcribes recordings with the Transcription API

Onboard to the Plaud Developer Platform

Sign in to the Plaud Developer Portal (It’s completely free with a generous device connection limit and transcription usage). Create an Embedded SDK Application to receive your Client ID and Secret Key.

Set Up the Starter App

Try the Plaud Embedded Skill to have your coding agent help you through your Starter App deployment.

npx skills add Plaud-AI/plaud-embedded-skills

Visit our GitHub repo for more details on the skill.

Prerequisites

Android Studio (JDK 17)
minSdk 21 (Android 5.0+), compileSdk 34
A physical Android device — the SDK libraries are arm64-v8a/armeabi-v7a, Android simulators are not supported
A Plaud device for end-to-end testing

Clone the starter app

You can find the GitHub repository for the starter app here.

git clone https://github.com/plaud-ai/plaud-sdk-public.git
cd android

Install Android Studio to build and test your Android Starter app.

brew install --cask android-studio

Retrieve a user token

The USER_ACCESS_TOKEN is the per-user JWT your backend mints by calling POST /open/partner/users/access-token. See the Authorization API reference for the full exchange flow.

Configure credentials

After navigating to the /android directory, create a local.properties file (gitignored) and add the user token, client ID, and API key (if using transcription).

local.properties

sdk.dir=/path/to/your/Android/sdk

# Required for SDK initialization
PLAUD_USER_ACCESS_TOKEN=your-jwt-token

# Required for Transcription API (optional, not needed for device features)
PLAUD_CLIENT_ID=your-client-id
PLAUD_API_KEY=your-api-key

(Optional) Apply branding

Four places control the entire visual identity:

App Name

Navigate to app/src/main/res/values/strings.xml. You can modify the app name, and other text on the welcome screen.

strings.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<resources>
    <string name="app_name">Plaud Template</string>

    <!-- Onboarding -->
    <string name="welcome_app_name">App name</string>
    <string name="get_started">Get Started</string>
    <string name="connect_later">Connect device later</string>

App icon

Create new image assets directly in Android Studio. Right-click res, then go to New > Image Asset.

Theme colors

In res/values/colors.xml, you have full control over te starter apps primary colors and color pallete.

colors.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<resources>
    <!-- Theme colors -->
    <color name="bg_primary">#F9F9F9</color>
    <color name="text_primary">#1F1F1F</color>
    <color name="text_secondary">#A3A3A3</color>
    <color name="separator">#EBEBEB</color>

Run & test with a real device

Open Android Studio, and wait for gradle to finish building the app. Once indexing and build is finished, connect your physical Android device and run the app.

Verify app launches, device pairs, recording syncs, and transcript appears on your Android app.

Unbind your Plaud device after testing and before uninstalling the Starter App!Plaud devices can only be bound to one application at a time (tied to your Partner Token). You will not be able to bind your Plaud device to another app (or the Plaud App) before unbinding from the Starter App.

Publishing to the Google Play Store

You will need a Google Play Developer Account to publish to the Play Store (current pricing is a one-time $25 registration fee).Google requires identity verification, and organization accounts also require D-U-N-S number verification — start this early, as it can take a few days.

Set a unique application ID

In app/build.gradle.kts, replace the template’s application ID with your own unique reverse-domain identifier. This value can never be changed once the app is published.

app/build.gradle

  android {
    namespace 'com.plaud.template'
    namespace 'com.yourorg.yourapp'
    compileSdk 34

    defaultConfig {
        applicationId "com.plaud.template"
        applicationId "com.yourorg.yourapp"
        minSdk 21

Bump versionCode on every upload — Play Console rejects a build that reuses a versionCode already in the track.

Generate an upload keystore

Play requires every build to be signed with a consistent upload key. In Android Studio, go to Build > Generate Signed App Bundle / APK, choose Android App Bundle, then Create new... to generate a keystore.

keytool -genkey -v -keystore upload-keystore.jks \
  -keyalg RSA -keysize 2048 -validity 10000 -alias upload

Store the keystore file and its passwords somewhere safe and out of version control. Losing your upload key means you can’t ship updates to an existing listing without going through Google’s key reset process.

Keep the credentials in local.properties (gitignored) alongside your Plaud credentials, and reference them from a signingConfigs block in app/build.gradle.kts.

Build a signed release bundle

Finish the Build > Generate Signed App Bundle / APK flow with the release build variant. Android Studio writes the bundle to app/release/app-release.aab.

./gradlew bundleRelease

The Plaud SDK ships arm64-v8a and armeabi-v7a native libraries. Leave ABI splits and abiFilters alone so both are packaged — Play serves the right slice per device automatically.

Create your app in Play Console

In Play Console, select Create app, then set your app name, default language, app type, and free/paid status. The application ID from Step 2 is claimed when you upload your first bundle.

Upload to a testing track

Under Testing > Internal testing, create a release and upload your .aab. Add your testers by email or Google Group, then share the opt-in link with them.

Complete the store listing and content declarations

Work through the Dashboard checklist. Items to emphasize for a conversation capture app are:

Data safety
Permissions declaration: the SDK requires Bluetooth and (on Android 11 and below) location permissions to scan for and connect to Plaud devices.
Privacy policy
Store listing assets — app icon (512×512), feature graphic (1024×500), and at least two phone screenshots.

Publish!

Once the checklist is complete, submit your production release for review! Google’s review typically takes a few days for a first submission.

Overview

Embedded SDK Reference

API Reference

Starter Apps & Guides

Resources

Onboard to the Plaud Developer Platform

Set Up the Starter App

Prerequisites

Clone the starter app

Retrieve a user token

Configure credentials

(Optional) Apply branding

App Name

App icon

Theme colors

Run & test with a real device

Publishing to the Google Play Store

​Onboard to the Plaud Developer Platform

​Set Up the Starter App

​Prerequisites

​Clone the starter app

​Retrieve a user token

​Configure credentials

​(Optional) Apply branding

​App Name

​App icon

​Theme colors

​Run & test with a real device

​Publishing to the Google Play Store

Onboard to the Plaud Developer Platform

Set Up the Starter App

Prerequisites

Clone the starter app

Retrieve a user token

Configure credentials

(Optional) Apply branding

App Name

App icon

Theme colors

Run & test with a real device

Publishing to the Google Play Store