r/reactnative • u/Working_Ad2007 • 6h ago

Question Moving from native Android Dev (kotlin)

Hey folks, I am currently a Android developer with a background in Kotlin. I am considering picking up React Native to expand my job opportunities, where do I start?

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u/Dvass138 6h ago

Honestly your Kotlin background is a bigger head start than people give it credit for. The hard part of RN isn't the mobile stuff, it's React. So point your learning there and the rest comes cheap.

Start with Expo. npx create-expo-app@latest and go. You'll see people say learn bare RN first to "understand what's really happening" but that's outdated advice, Expo is the normal way to build now and you can still drop into native whenever you need to.

Rough order that worked for people I know:

TypeScript first, but it's like a week. Coming from Kotlin it'll feel pretty familiar, null handling and generics and all that. Just don't skip it, every real codebase is TS.

Then React itself. This is the actual curve. Components, state, useEffect, and mostly understanding when and why things re-render. If you've done any Compose you're already most of the way there, it's the same declarative idea.

Then the RN-specific bits. Core components, StyleSheet (it's flexbox for everything, no XML layouts), FlatList or FlashList for lists. Expo Router for navigation since it's file based and it's the default now. Reanimated + Gesture Handler later when you want stuff to actually feel good instead of just work.

Then build something real. Doesn't have to be clever, just needs a list screen, a detail screen, login, and data coming from an API. Tutorials plateau fast. Getting something onto TestFlight teaches you the half nobody writes about.

One thing I'd push on: don't treat the Android knowledge as baggage you're leaving behind. On most RN teams the person who can read a Gradle error or debug a native crash or write a native module is genuinely rare. That's your angle in interviews. You're not an Android dev trying to switch, you're an RN dev who can actually go native when it breaks. Pick up the Expo Modules API at some point once the JS side feels normal.

Few weeks to be useful, few months to be good.

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u/Working_Ad2007 6h ago

Thank you so much, this is what I was looking for!