// the find
GitLiveApp/firebase-kotlin-sdk
A Kotlin-first SDK for Firebase
A Kotlin Multiplatform wrapper around the official Firebase SDKs (Android, iOS, JS, JVM) that replaces callbacks and Tasks with coroutines and Flows. If you're building a KMP app and want to use Firebase from shared code without dropping into platform-specific source sets, this is the only real option. It's backed by GitLive, who use it in their own product.
The API design is genuinely thoughtful — cold Flows for listeners, suspend functions instead of Task callbacks, and kotlinx.serialization instead of platform-specific reflection. The binary API validation via `apiDump` catches accidental breakage across releases. The goal of near-binary compatibility with the Android SDK's package imports (just swap `com.google` for `dev.gitlive`) means porting existing Android code is mechanical, not a rewrite. Firebase emulator support in tests is a first-class concern, which matters when you actually want to test Firestore queries.
API coverage is uneven and the table doesn't hide it: Cloud Storage is at 40%, Remote Config at 20%, Cloud Messaging and Performance at 10%. The JVM target requires the firebase-java-sdk, a separate project with its own setup that isn't wired up automatically — desktop support has a meaningful hidden cost. iOS requires you to manually link the Firebase iOS SDK yourself (Cocoapods or SPM); there's no transitive dependency, so a new contributor will hit a confusing linker error before they get to Hello World. The README still has a `//TODO don't use GlobalScope` in a code example that's been there long enough to become a meme.