Launch screens

From google material design documentation.

The launch screen is a user’s first experience of your application.

Because launching your app while displaying a blank canvas increases its perceived loading time, consider using a placeholder UI or a branded launch screen.

How to add?

I. Declare custom drawable.xml file with items for launch screen background.

<layer-list xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android">
    <item
        android:drawable="@color/blue"/>

    <item>
        <bitmap
            android:gravity="center"
            android:src="@drawable/logo"/>
    </item>
</layer-list>

II. Declare custom style in your styles.xml using the new drawable as background.

<style name="SplashTheme" parent="Theme.AppCompat.NoActionBar">
    <item name="android:windowBackground">@drawable/background_splash</item>
</style>

Note

If your API Level is greater than v19, you can make Status Bar and Navigation Bar translucent setting attributes android:windowTranslucentStatus and android:windowTranslucentNavigation to true.

III. Apply this style to your splash activity via android:theme attribute in your AndroidManifest.xml file.

<activity
    android:name=".SplashActivity"
    android:theme="@style/SplashTheme">
    <intent-filter>
        <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />

        <category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" />
    </intent-filter>
</activity>