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Version: 7.x

Navigation events

You can listen to various events emitted by React Navigation to get notified of certain events, and in some cases, override the default action. There are few core events such as focus, blur etc. (documented below) that work for every navigator, as well as navigator specific events that work only for certain navigators.

Apart from the core events, each navigator can emit their own custom events. For example, stack navigator emits transitionStart and transitionEnd events, tab navigator emits tabPress event etc. You can find details about the events emitted on the individual navigator's documentation.

Core events​

Following are the events available in every navigator:

focus​

This event is emitted when the screen comes into focus.

For most cases, the useFocusEffect hook might be appropriate than adding the listener manually. See this guide for more details to decide which API you should use.

blur​

This event is emitted when the screen goes out of focus.

state​

This event is emitted when the navigator's state changes. This event receives the navigator's state in the event data (event.data.state).

beforeRemove​

This event is emitted when the user is leaving the screen due to a navigation action. It is possible to prevent the user from leaving the screen by calling e.preventDefault() in the event listener.

React.useEffect(
  () =>
    navigation.addListener('beforeRemove', (e) => {
      if (!hasUnsavedChanges) {
        return;
      }

      // Prevent default behavior of leaving the screen
      e.preventDefault();

      // Prompt the user before leaving the screen
      Alert.alert(
        'Discard changes?',
        'You have unsaved changes. Are you sure to discard them and leave the screen?',
        [
          {
            text: "Don't leave",
            style: 'cancel',
            onPress: () => {
              // Do nothing
            },
          },
          {
            text: 'Discard',
            style: 'destructive',
            // If the user confirmed, then we dispatch the action we blocked earlier
            // This will continue the action that had triggered the removal of the screen
            onPress: () => navigation.dispatch(e.data.action),
          },
        ]
      );
    }),
  [navigation, hasUnsavedChanges]
);
note

Preventing the action in this event doesn't work properly with @react-navigation/native-stack. We recommend using the usePreventRemove hook instead.

Listening to events​

There are multiple ways to listen to events from the navigators. Each callback registered as an event listener receives an event object as its argument. The event object contains few properties:

  • data - Additional data regarding the event passed by the navigator. This can be undefined if no data was passed.
  • target - The route key for the screen that should receive the event. For some events, this maybe undefined if the event wasn't related to a specific screen.
  • preventDefault - For some events, there may be a preventDefault method on the event object. Calling this method will prevent the default action performed by the event (such as switching tabs on tabPress). Support for preventing actions are only available for certain events like tabPress and won't work for all events.

You can listen to events with the following APIs:

Inside a screen, you can add listeners on the navigation object with the addListener method. The addListener method takes 2 arguments: type of the event, and a callback to be called on the event. It returns a function that can be called to unsubscribe from the event.

Example:

const unsubscribe = navigation.addListener('tabPress', (e) => {
  // Prevent default action
  e.preventDefault();
});

Normally, you'd add an event listener in React.useEffect for function components. For example:

function ProfileScreen() {
  const navigation = useNavigation();

  React.useEffect(() => {
    const unsubscribe = navigation.addListener('focus', () => {
      // Screen was focused
    });
    return unsubscribe;
  }, [navigation]);

  React.useEffect(() => {
    const unsubscribe = navigation.addListener('blur', () => {
      // Screen was unfocused
    });
    return unsubscribe;
  }, [navigation]);

  // Rest of the component
}
Try on Snack

The unsubscribe function can be returned as the cleanup function in the effect.

For class components, you can add the event in the componentDidMount lifecycle method and unsubscribe in componentWillUnmount:

class Profile extends React.Component {
  componentDidMount() {
    this._unsubscribe = navigation.addListener('focus', () => {
      // do something
    });
  }

  componentWillUnmount() {
    this._unsubscribe();
  }

  render() {
    // Content of the component
  }
}

One thing to keep in mind is that you can only listen to events from the immediate navigator with addListener. For example, if you try to add a listener in a screen that's inside a stack that's nested in a tab, it won't get the tabPress event. If you need to listen to an event from a parent navigator, you may use navigation.getParent to get a reference to the parent screen's navigation object and add a listener.

const unsubscribe = navigation
  .getParent('MyTabs')
  .addListener('tabPress', (e) => {
    // Do something
  });

Here 'MyTabs' refers to the value you pass in the id prop of the parent Tab.Navigator whose event you want to listen to.

listeners prop on Screen​

Sometimes you might want to add a listener from the component where you defined the navigator rather than inside the screen. You can use the listeners prop on the Screen component to add listeners. The listeners prop takes an object with the event names as keys and the listener callbacks as values.

Example:

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

You can also pass a callback which returns the object with listeners. It'll receive navigation and route as the arguments.

Example:

const Tab = createBottomTabNavigatior({
  screens: {
    Chat: {
      screen: Chat,
      listeners: ({ navigation, route }) => ({
        tabPress: (e) => {
          // Prevent default action
          e.preventDefault;

          // Do something with the `navigation` object
          navigation.navigate('AnotherPlace');
        },
      }),
    },
  },
});

screenListeners prop on the navigator​

You can pass a prop named screenListeners to the navigator component, where you can specify listeners for events from all screens for this navigator. This can be useful if you want to listen to specific events regardless of the screen, or want to listen to common events such as state which is emitted to all screens.

Example:

const Stack = createNativeStackNavigator({
  screenListeners: {
    state: (e) => {
      // Do something with the state
      console.log('state changed', e.data);
    },
  },
  screens: {
    Home: HomeScreen,
    Profile: ProfileScreen,
  },
});

Similar to listeners, you can also pass a function to screenListeners. The function will receive the navigation object and the route object for each screen. This can be useful if you need access to the navigation object.

const Tab = createBottomTabNavigatior({
  screenListeners: ({ navigation }) => ({
    state: (e) => {
      // Do something with the state
      console.log('state changed', e.data);

      // Do something with the `navigation` object
      if (!navigation.canGoBack()) {
        console.log("we're on the initial screen");
      }
    },
  }),
  screens: {
    Home: HomeScreen,
    Profile: ProfileScreen,
  },
});