How to use android:usesCleartextTraffic below Marshmallow (API-23)

Question

I am trying to secure WebView from cleartext traffic. As mentioned in the documentation. I have to set android:usesCleartextTraffic as false to achieve this. But this works on API level 23 and above. My minimum sdk is 22. How can I make sure app doesn't crash or create any problem on device running below API level 23 ? Or how can I programmatically set that attribute value in the application tag in Manifest.xml ?

Answer 1

As suggested in an article @ Android Developers Blogspot:

You don’t have to set minSdkVersion or targetSdkVersion of your app to 23 (Android Marshmallow) to use android:usesCleartextTraffic. On older platforms, this attribute is simply ignored and thus has no effect.

Hope this solves your query.