Building for Release

CLI Build Commands

The CLI provides vue-native build for creating release builds. It automatically bundles the JS before building the native project.

# Build iOS release
vue-native build ios

# Build Android APK
vue-native build android

# Build Android App Bundle (.aab) for Play Store
vue-native build android --aab

Build Options

Flag	Description
`--mode <mode>`	Build mode (default: `release`)
`--output <path>`	Output directory for the build artifact (default: `./build`)
`--scheme <scheme>`	Xcode scheme to build (iOS only)
`--aab`	Build Android App Bundle instead of APK (Android only)

Examples

# Release build with custom output directory
vue-native build ios --output ./artifacts

# Debug build
vue-native build ios --mode debug

# Specific Xcode scheme
vue-native build ios --scheme MyApp-Staging

# Android App Bundle for Play Store
vue-native build android --aab --output ./release

The CLI auto-bundles the JS before running the native build — you do not need to run bun run build separately.

Manual Build

If you prefer to build manually without the CLI, you can bundle the JS first:

bun run build

This produces an optimized, minified dist/vue-native-bundle.js.

iOS

Build the bundle: bun run build
Open ios/ in Xcode
Select your scheme and a real device or "Any iOS Device"
Product → Archive
In the Organizer, click Distribute App and follow the steps

The build script in project.yml automatically copies dist/vue-native-bundle.js into the app bundle at build time.

Android

Build the bundle: bun run build
Copy dist/vue-native-bundle.js to android/app/src/main/assets/
In Android Studio: Build → Generate Signed Bundle / APK
Choose Android App Bundle for Play Store, or APK for direct distribution

Automate asset copying

Add a Gradle task to your android/app/build.gradle.kts to copy the bundle automatically:

tasks.register<Copy>("copyJsBundle") {
    from("../../dist/vue-native-bundle.js")
    into("src/main/assets")
}
tasks.named("preBuild") { dependsOn("copyJsBundle") }

CI Pipeline

Every push to main and every pull request runs three parallel jobs in GitHub Actions:

Job	Runner	Steps
TypeScript	ubuntu-latest	lint → typecheck → build → test → dead code check (knip)
Swift	macos-14	SwiftLint → build VueNativeCore → XCTest (114 tests on iPhone simulator)
Kotlin	ubuntu-latest	ktlint → build VueNativeCore → JUnit + Robolectric (83 tests)

Running the full pipeline locally

# TypeScript
bun run lint && bun run typecheck && bun run build && bun run test

# iOS
cd native/ios && swiftlint lint
xcodebuild test \
  -scheme VueNativeCore \
  -sdk iphonesimulator \
  -destination 'platform=iOS Simulator,name=iPhone 16,OS=18.0' \
  -skipPackagePluginValidation

# Android
cd native/android
./gradlew :VueNativeCore:ktlintCheck :VueNativeCore:testReleaseUnitTest

Publishing

Pushing a git tag matching v* (e.g., v0.4.13) triggers the publish workflow:

npm — publishes @thelacanians/vue-native-runtime, @thelacanians/vue-native-navigation, @thelacanians/vue-native-vite-plugin, and @thelacanians/vue-native-cli to npm
Swift Package — validated via xcodebuild (SPM resolves directly from the git tag)
Android Maven — publishes com.vuenative:core to GitHub Packages