material-components/material-components-android · error · UnsupportedOperationException

Changing divider drawables have no effect. ChipGroup do not

Error message

Changing divider drawables have no effect. ChipGroup do not use divider drawables as spacing.

What it means

ChipGroup is a FlowLayout, not a LinearLayout; spacing between chips is controlled by chipSpacingHorizontal/chipSpacingVertical, not divider drawables. The deprecated setDividerDrawableHorizontal throws UnsupportedOperationException to fail fast instead of silently ignoring the call. The javadoc directs you to setChipSpacingHorizontal.

Source

Thrown at lib/java/com/google/android/material/chip/ChipGroup.java:232

  public void setOnHierarchyChangeListener(OnHierarchyChangeListener listener) {
    // the user listener is delegated to our pass-through listener
    passThroughListener.onHierarchyChangeListener = listener;
  }

  @Override
  protected void onFinishInflate() {
    super.onFinishInflate();

    // checks the appropriate chip as requested in the XML file
    if (defaultCheckedId != View.NO_ID) {
      checkableGroup.check(defaultCheckedId);
    }
  }

  /** @deprecated Use {@link ChipGroup#setChipSpacingHorizontal(int)} instead. */
  @Deprecated
  public void setDividerDrawableHorizontal(Drawable divider) {
    throw new UnsupportedOperationException(
        "Changing divider drawables have no effect. ChipGroup do not use divider drawables as "
            + "spacing.");
  }

  /** @deprecated Use {@link ChipGroup#setChipSpacingVertical(int)} instead. */
  @Deprecated
  public void setDividerDrawableVertical(@Nullable Drawable divider) {
    throw new UnsupportedOperationException(
        "Changing divider drawables have no effect. ChipGroup do not use divider drawables as "
            + "spacing.");
  }

  /** @deprecated Use {@link ChipGroup#setChipSpacingHorizontal(int)} instead. */
  @Deprecated
  public void setShowDividerHorizontal(int dividerMode) {
    throw new UnsupportedOperationException(
        "Changing divider modes has no effect. ChipGroup do not use divider drawables as spacing.");
  }

View on GitHub (pinned to ac7e18efee)

Solutions

1. Replace setDividerDrawableHorizontal(d) with chipGroup.setChipSpacingHorizontal(dp) or the app:chipSpacingHorizontal XML attribute.
2. If actual visual dividers are required, place them as separate child views instead.

Example fix

// before
chipGroup.setDividerDrawableHorizontal(divider) // throws

// after
chipGroup.setChipSpacingHorizontal(resources.getDimensionPixelOffset(R.dimen.chip_spacing))

fun setSpacing(group: ChipGroup, @Px horizontal: Int) {
  group.chipSpacingHorizontal = horizontal // never call setDividerDrawableHorizontal
}

When it happens

Trigger: Calling chipGroup.setDividerDrawableHorizontal(drawable) on a ChipGroup; copying LinearLayout divider setup code onto a ChipGroup.

Common situations: Migrating a LinearLayout of buttons to ChipGroup and carrying over setDividerDrawable calls; Android Studio deprecation autofill picking the method without noticing it throws.

Related errors

• Changing divider modes has no effect. ChipGroup do not use d
• Changing flex wrap not allowed. ChipGroup exposes a singleLi
• The wrap overflow mode is not compatible to the vertical ori
• The wrap overflow mode is not compatible with wrap_content l
• All children of a RecyclerView using CarouselLayoutManager m

AI-assisted analysis of material-components/material-components-android@ac7e18efee (2026-08-14). Data as JSON: /api/errors/8e90786cb62da481. Report an issue: GitHub.