Static configuration

The bulk of the static configuration is done using the createXNavigator functions, e.g. createNativeStackNavigator, createBottomTabNavigator, createDrawerNavigator etc. We'll refer to these functions as createXNavigator in the rest of this guide.

createXNavigator

The createXNavigator functions take one argument, which is an object with the following properties:

• Same props as the navigator component, e.g. id, initialRouteName, screenOptions etc. See the docs for each navigator for more details on the props they accept.
• screens - an object containing configuration for each screen in the navigator.
• groups - an optional object containing groups of screens (equivalent to Group in the dynamic API).

For example:

const RootStack = createNativeStackNavigator({
  initialRouteName: 'Home',
  screenOptions: {
    headerTintColor: 'white',
    headerStyle: {
      backgroundColor: 'tomato',
    },
  },
  screens: {
    Home: HomeScreen,
    Profile: ProfileScreen,
  },
});

screens

The screens object can contain key value pairs where the key is the name of the screen and the value can be several things:

• A component to render:

  const RootStack = createNativeStackNavigator({
    screens: {
      Home: HomeScreen,
    },
  });

• A navigator configured using createXNavigator for nested navigators:

  const HomeTabs = createBottomTabNavigator({
    screens: {
      Groups: GroupsScreen,
      Chats: ChatsScreen,
    },
  });
  
  const RootStack = createNativeStackNavigator({
    screens: {
      Home: HomeTabs,
    },
  });

• An object containing configuration for the screen. This configuration contains the various properties:

  const RootStack = createNativeStackNavigator({
    screens: {
      Home: {
        screen: HomeScreen,
        linking: {
          path: 'home',
        },
      },
    },
  });

  See Screen configuration for more details.

groups

The groups object can contain key value pairs where the key is the name of the group and the value is the group configuration. The group configuration can contain the following properties:

• if - this can be used to conditionally render the group and works the same as the if property in the screen configuration.
• screenOptions - default options for all screens under this group.
• screens - an object containing configuration for each screen in the group. The configuration is the same as the screens object in the navigator configuration.

Example:

const RootStack = createNativeStackNavigator({
  screens: {
    Home: HomeScreen,
    Profile: ProfileScreen,
  },
  groups: {
    Guest: {
      if: useIsGuest,
      screenOptions: {
        headerShown: false,
      },
      screens: {
        // ...
      }
    },
    User: {
      if: useIsUser,
      screens: {
        // ...
      }
    }
  },
});

The keys of the groups object (e.g. Guest, User) are used as the navigationKey for the group - this means if a screen is defined in 2 groups and the groups use the if property, the screen will remount if the condition changes resulting in one group being removed and other group being used. You can use any string as the key.

Screen configuration

The configuration object for a screen can contain the following properties:

screen

The React component or navigator to render for the screen:

const RootStack = createNativeStackNavigator({
  screens: {
    Home: {
      screen: HomeScreen,
    },
  },
});

The screen components defined with the static configuration receive the route prop. Unlike the dynamic API, they don't get the navigation object as prop and it must be accessed via the useNavigation hook.

linking

Linking configuration for the screen. It can be either a string for a path or an object with the linking configuration:

const RootStack = createNativeStackNavigator({
  screens: {
    Profile: {
      screen: ProfileScreen,
      linking: {
        path: 'u/:userId',
        parse: {
          userId: (id) => id.replace(/^@/, ''),
        },
        stringify: {
          userId: (id) => `@${id}`,
        },
      },
    },
    Chat: {
      screen: ChatScreen,
      linking: 'chat/:chatId',
    },
  },
});

The linking object supports the same configuration options described in Configuring links such as parse, stringify and exact.

To make deep links work on native apps, you also need to configure your app and pass prefixes to the navigation component returned by createStaticNavigation:

const Navigation = createStaticNavigation(RootStack);

const linking = {
  prefixes: ['https://example.com', 'example://'],
};

function App() {
  return <Navigation linking={linking} />;
}

if

Callback to determine whether the screen should be rendered or not. It doesn't receive any arguments. This can be useful for conditional rendering of screens, e.g. - if you want to render a different screen for logged in users.

You can use a custom hook to use custom logic to determine the return value:

const useIsLoggedIn = () => {
  const { isLoggedIn } = React.useContext(AuthContext);

  return isLoggedIn;
};

const RootStack = createNativeStackNavigator({
  screens: {
    Home: {
      screen: HomeScreen,
      if: useIsLoggedIn,
    },
  },
});

The above example will only render the HomeScreen if the user is logged in.

For more details, see Authentication flow.

options

Options to configure how the screen gets presented in the navigator. It accepts either an object or a function returning an object:

const RootStack = createNativeStackNavigator({
  screens: {
    Home: {
      screen: HomeScreen,
      options: {
        title: 'Awesome app',
      },
    },
  },
});

When you pass a function, it'll receive the route and navigation:

const RootStack = createNativeStackNavigator({
  screens: {
    Profile: {
      screen: ProfileScreen,
      options: ({ route, navigation }) => ({
        title: route.params.userId,
      }),
    },
  },
});

See Options for screens for more details and examples.

initialParams

Initial params to use for the screen. If a screen is used as initialRouteName, it'll contain the params from initialParams. If you navigate to a new screen, the params passed are shallow merged with the initial params.

const RootStack = createNativeStackNavigator({
  screens: {
    Details: {
      screen: DetailsScreen,
      initialParams: { itemId: 5 },
    },
  },
});

getId

Callback to return an unique ID to use for the screen. It receives an object with the route params:

const RootStack = createNativeStackNavigator({
  screens: {
    Profile: {
      screen: ProfileScreen,
      getId: ({ params }) => params.userId,
    },
  },
});

By default, calling navigate('ScreenName', params) identifies the screen by its name, and navigates to the existing screen instead of adding a new one. If you specify getId and it doesn't return undefined, the screen is identified by both the screen name and the returned ID.

This is useful for preventing multiple instances of the same screen in the navigator, e.g. - when params.userId is used as an ID, subsequent navigation to the screen with the same userId will navigate to the existing screen instead of adding a new one to the stack. If the navigation was with a different userId, then it'll add a new screen.

listeners

Event listeners to subscribe to. It takes an object with the event names as keys and the listener callbacks as values:

const BottomTab = createBottomTabNavigator({
  screens: {
    Chat: {
      screen: ChatScreen,
      listeners: {
        tabPress: (e) => {
          // Prevent default action
          e.preventDefault();
        },
      },
    },
  },
});

createStaticNavigation

The createStaticNavigation function takes the static config returned by createXNavigator functions and returns a React component to render:

const Navigation = createStaticNavigation(RootStack);

function App() {
  return <Navigation />;
}

This component is a wrapper around the NavigationContainer component and accepts the same props and ref as the NavigationContainer component. There's however one difference - the linking prop accepted by this component doesn't take a config property. Instead, the linking config is automatically inferred from the static config.

This is intended to be rendered once at the root of your app similar to how you'd use NavigationContainer component.

createComponentForStaticNavigation

The createComponentForStaticNavigation function takes the static config returned by createXNavigator functions and returns a React component to render. The second argument is a name for the component that'd be used in React DevTools:

const RootStackNavigator = createComponentForStaticNavigation(RootStack, 'RootNavigator');

The returned component doesn't take any props. All of the configuration is inferred from the static config. It's essentially the same as defining a component using the dynamic API.

This looks similar to createStaticNavigation however they are very different. When using static configuration, you'd never use this function directly. The only time you'd use this is if you're migrating away from static configuration and want to reuse existing code you wrote instead of rewriting it to the dynamic API. See Combining static and dynamic APIs for more details.

createPathConfigForStaticNavigation

The createPathConfigForStaticNavigation function takes the static config returned by createXNavigator functions and returns a path config object that can be used within the linking config.

const config = {
  screens: {
    Home: {
      screens: createPathConfigForStaticNavigation(HomeTabs),
    },
  },
};

Similar to createComponentForStaticNavigation, this is intended to be used when migrating away from static configuration. See Combining static and dynamic APIs for more details.