Refresh Previous Screen after Going Back in React Navigation

Introduction

This is an Example to Refresh the Previous Screen after Going Back to the old Screen in React Native using React Navigation. If you are familiar with the navigation in React Native then I hope you very well know React Navigation. We have also used the same navigator for this example.

While working with multiple screens we usually switch between screens and sometimes wants to refresh the previous screen as the result set should change. If we talk about React Navigation it does not provide the default refresh facility as in most of the cases we do not want to rerender the view. So we have to add some extra things to refresh the previous screens while going back.

To refresh the previous screen when going back

As a JavaScript developer, we very well know about the listeners. In this case, we will also use a listener called focus to find the current state of the Screen/ Activity.

To apply focus listener

const unsubscribe = navigation.addListener('focus', () => {
  // Do whatever you want
});

To remove the listener

unsubscribe;

In this example, we will create 2 Screens FirstPage and SecondPage and will make a count on both the screens to see whether it is refreshing or not. If we run the application without the didFocus listener we have no way to reset the counter when coming back to FirstPage so counter will increase as we are unable to refresh the screen but in other condition when we apply the didFocus listener we can reset the counter or basically we can say that we can refresh the screen. So Let’s get Started with example.

To Make a React Native App

Getting started with React Native will help you to know more about the way you can make a React Native project. We are going to use react native command line interface to make our React Native App.

If you have previously installed a global react-native-cli package, please remove it as it may cause unexpected issues:

npm uninstall -g react-native-cli @react-native-community/cli

Run the following commands to create a new React Native project

npx react-native init ProjectName

If you want to start a new project with a specific React Native version, you can use the --version argument:

npx react-native init ProjectName --version X.XX.X

Note If the above command is failing, you may have old version of react-native or react-native-cli installed globally on your pc. Try uninstalling the cli and run the cli using npx.

This will make a project structure with an index file named App.js in your project directory.

Installation of Dependencies

To navigate between screens we need to add react-navigation and other supporting dependencies.

To install the dependencies open the terminal and jump into your project

cd ProjectName

1. Install react-navigation

npm install @react-navigation/native --save

2. Other supporting libraries react-native-screens and react-native-safe-area-context

npm install react-native-screens react-native-safe-area-context --save

react-native-screens package requires one additional configuration step to properly work on Android devices. Edit MainActivity.java file which is located in android/app/src/main/java/<your package name>/MainActivity.java.

Add the following code to the body of MainActivity class:

@Override
protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
  super.onCreate(null);
}

and make sure to add the following import statement at the top of this file below your package statement:

import android.os.Bundle;

This change is required to avoid crashes related to View state being not persisted consistently across Activity restarts.

3. For the Stack Navigator install

npm install @react-navigation/native-stack --save

CocoaPods Installation

Please use the following command to install CocoaPods

npx pod-install

Project Structure

To start with this Example you need to create a directory named pages in your project and create two files FirstPage.js and SecondPage.js

Code

Now Open App.js in any code editor and replace the code with the following code

App.js

// Refresh Previous Screen after Going Back in React Navigation
// https://aboutreact.com/refresh-previous-screen-react-navigation/

import React from 'react';

import {NavigationContainer} from '@react-navigation/native';
import {createNativeStackNavigator} from '@react-navigation/native-stack';

import FirstPage from './pages/FirstPage';
import SecondPage from './pages/SecondPage';

const Stack = createNativeStackNavigator();

const App = () => {
  return (
    <NavigationContainer>
      <Stack.Navigator initialRouteName="FirstPage">
        <Stack.Screen
          name="FirstPage"
          component={FirstPage}
          options={{
            title: 'First Page', //Set Header Title
            headerStyle: {
              backgroundColor: '#f4511e', //Set Header color
            },
            headerTintColor: '#fff', //Set Header text color
            headerTitleStyle: {
              fontWeight: 'bold', //Set Header text style
            },
          }}
        />
        <Stack.Screen
          name="SecondPage"
          component={SecondPage}
          options={{
            title: 'Second Page', //Set Header Title
            headerStyle: {
              backgroundColor: '#f4511e', //Set Header color
            },
            headerTintColor: '#fff', //Set Header text color
            headerTitleStyle: {
              fontWeight: 'bold', //Set Header text style
            },
          }}
        />
      </Stack.Navigator>
    </NavigationContainer>
  );
};

export default App;

Open FirstPage.js in any code editor and replace the code with the following code.

FirstPage.js

// Refresh Previous Screen after Going Back in React Navigation
// https://aboutreact.com/refresh-previous-screen-react-navigation/

import React, {useEffect, useState} from 'react';
import {Button, View, Text, SafeAreaView} from 'react-native';

const FirstPage = ({navigation}) => {
  const [count, setCount] = useState(0);

  useEffect(() => {
    // Interval to update count
    const interval = setInterval(() => {
      setCount((count) => count + 1);
    }, 1000);

    // Subscribe for the focus Listener
    const unsubscribe = navigation.addListener('focus', () => {
      setCount(0);
    });

    return () => {
      // Clear setInterval in case of screen unmount
      clearTimeout(interval);
      // Unsubscribe for the focus Listener
      unsubscribe;
    };
  }, [navigation]);

  return (
    <SafeAreaView style={{flex: 1}}>
      <View style={{flex: 1, padding: 16}}>
        <View
          style={{
            flex: 1,
            alignItems: 'center',
            justifyContent: 'center',
          }}>
          <Text
            style={{
              fontSize: 25,
              textAlign: 'center',
              marginBottom: 16,
            }}>
            This is the First Page of the app
          </Text>
          <Text style={{textAlign: 'center', paddingVertical: 10}}>
            Counter will reset when you came back from Second Screen
          </Text>
          <Text>Count: {count}</Text>
          <Button
            title="Go to Second Sreen"
            onPress={() => navigation.navigate('SecondPage')}
          />
        </View>
        <Text style={{textAlign: 'center', color: 'grey'}}>
          www.aboutreact.com
        </Text>
      </View>
    </SafeAreaView>
  );
};

export default FirstPage;

Open SecondPage.js in any code editor and replace the code with the following code.

SecondPage.js

// Refresh Previous Screen after Going Back in React Navigation
// https://aboutreact.com/refresh-previous-screen-react-navigation/

import React from 'react';
import {View, Text, SafeAreaView} from 'react-native';

const SecondPage = () => {
  return (
    <SafeAreaView style={{flex: 1}}>
      <View style={{flex: 1, padding: 16}}>
        <View
          style={{
            flex: 1,
            alignItems: 'center',
            justifyContent: 'center',
          }}>
          <Text
            style={{
              fontSize: 25,
              textAlign: 'center',
              marginBottom: 16,
            }}>
            This is Second Page of the App
          </Text>
        </View>
        <Text style={{textAlign: 'center', color: 'grey'}}>
          www.aboutreact.com
        </Text>
      </View>
    </SafeAreaView>
  );
};

export default SecondPage;

To Run the React Native App

Open the terminal again and jump into your project using.

cd ProjectName

1. Start Metro Bundler

First, you will need to start Metro, the JavaScript bundler that ships with React Native. To start Metro bundler run following command:

npx react-native start

Once you start Metro Bundler it will run forever on your terminal until you close it. Let Metro Bundler run in its own terminal. Open a new terminal and run the application.

2. Start React Native Application

To run the project on an Android Virtual Device or on real debugging device:

npx react-native run-android

or on the iOS Simulator by running (macOS only)

npx react-native run-ios

Output Screenshots

Without Refresh Event Listener (Without didFocus)

With Refresh Event Listener (With didFocus)

Output in Online Emulator

This is how you can Refresh the Previous Screen after Going Back in React Navigation. If you have any doubts or you want to share something about the topic you can comment below or contact us here. There will be more posts coming soon. Stay tuned!

Hope you liked it. 🙂