How do I disable orientation change on Android?

Question

Update April 2013: Don't do this. It wasn't a good idea in 2009 when I first answered the question and it really isn't a good idea now. See this answer by hackbod for reasons:

Avoid reloading activity with asynctask on orientation change in android

Add android:configChanges="keyboardHidden|orientation" to your AndroidManifest.xml. This tells the system what configuration changes you are going to handle yourself - in this case by doing nothing.

<activity android:name="MainActivity"
     android:screenOrientation="portrait"
     android:configChanges="keyboardHidden|orientation">

See Developer reference configChanges for more details.

However, your application can be interrupted at any time, e.g. by a phone call, so you really should add code to save the state of your application when it is paused.

Update: As of Android 3.2, you also need to add "screenSize":

<activity
    android:name="MainActivity"
    android:screenOrientation="portrait"
    android:configChanges="keyboardHidden|orientation|screenSize">

From Developer guide Handling the Configuration Change Yourself

Caution: Beginning with Android 3.2 (API level 13), the "screen size" also changes when the device switches between portrait and landscape orientation. Thus, if you want to prevent runtime restarts due to orientation change when developing for API level 13 or higher (as declared by the minSdkVersion and targetSdkVersion attributes), you must include the "screenSize" value in addition to the "orientation" value. That is, you must declare android:configChanges="orientation|screenSize". However, if your application targets API level 12 or lower, then your activity always handles this configuration change itself (this configuration change does not restart your activity, even when running on an Android 3.2 or higher device).

You need to modify AndroidManifest.xml as Intrications (previously Ashton) mentioned and make sure the activity handles the onConfigurationChanged event as you want it handled. This is how it should look:

@Override
public void onConfigurationChanged(Configuration newConfig) {
    super.onConfigurationChanged(newConfig);
    setRequestedOrientation(ActivityInfo.SCREEN_ORIENTATION_PORTRAIT);
}

I've always found you need both

android:screenOrientation="nosensor" android:configChanges="keyboardHidden|orientation"

As said, set android:configChanges of your Activity (in manifest file) to keyboardHidden|orientation and then:

1) Override onConfigurationChanged()

@Override
public void onConfigurationChanged(Configuration newConfig) {
    super.onConfigurationChanged(newConfig);
    //here you can handle orientation change
}

2) Add this line to your activity's onCreate()

setRequestedOrientation(ActivityInfo.SCREEN_ORIENTATION_LANDSCAPE);

It's better than add same line to onConfigurationChanged, because your app will turn to portrait mode and then back to landscape (it will happen only one time, but it's annoying).

Also you can set android:screenOrientation="nosensor" for your activity (in manifest). But using this way you're a not able to handle orientation changes at all.

Use this..

    android:screenOrientation="portrait"

In OnCreate method of your activity use this code:

    @Override
public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
    super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
    this.setRequestedOrientation(ActivityInfo.SCREEN_ORIENTATION_PORTRAIT);

Now your orientation will be set to portrait and will never change.

In the AndroidManifest.xml file, for each activity you want to lock add the last screenOrientation line:

android:label="@string/app_name"
android:name=".Login"
android:screenOrientation="portrait" >

Or android:screenOrientation="landscape".