Strategic Guide to Migrating Legacy Android Apps from XML to Jetpack Compose

Getir's Android team learned the hard way: migrating millions of users from XML to Jetpack Compose isn't about rewriting screens. It's about avoiding the performance traps that come with mixing old and new.

This deep dive from Getir's engineering team chronicles their large-scale migration to Jetpack Compose in a production app serving millions of daily users. They share the architectural decisions, performance pitfalls, and team dynamics that shaped their 18-month transformation from legacy XML to modern declarative UI.

Key Takeaways

• Hybrid XML-Compose screens created state management hell and scroll performance nightmares
• Unstable List types in UiState forced entire product lists to recompose unnecessarily
• ImmutableList adoption and contentType keys cut recomposition counts by 90% in critical flows
• Team built shared Compose component repo before migrating screens to prevent duplicate work
• A/B tested new Compose screens with user segments to catch issues before full rollout

Their custom Gradle configuration for managing Compose across dozens of modules reveals a scalable approach most migration guides never mention.