Phonegap / Cordova 4.x app with Android Studio 1.x

I assume that you have a working installation of PhoneGap or Cordova CLI. In this post I use the Cordova CLI which is distributed as an npm package in a ready-to-use format (npm install -g cordova).

At first we have to create the app and at the android platform with the Cordova CLI:

cordova create MyCordovaApp de.flatphormesmedia MyCordovaApp  

MyCordovaApp\cordova platform add android  

Next we have to build the the project for the Android platform. This step is important as it adds the android target to the Cordova project

MyCordovaApp> cordova build android  

Cordova 4.1.2 and prior still generates Gradle 1.x files so you have to change the following lines in both build.gradle files under

MyCordovaApp\platforms\android\build.gradle  
MyCordovaApp\platforms\android\CordovaLib\build.gradle  

from

dependencies {  
        classpath 'com.android.tools.build:gradle:0.10.+'
    }

to

dependencies {  
        classpath 'com.android.tools.build:gradle:1.0.+'
    }

and

android {  
    ...
        buildToolsVersion "19.0.0"
    ...

to

android {  
    ...
        buildToolsVersion "19.1.0"
    ...

Now it's time to start your Android Studio and import the project with Gradle under

MyCordovaApp\platforms\android\build.gradle .