Back to results for “Fundamentals”
Flutter › State Management with setState

How do you properly manage several genuinely separate distinct pieces of local state together within just one single StatefulWidget, such as both a loading flag and a genuinely separate list of fetched items?

Intermediate

Answer

Managing several genuinely separate distinct pieces of state together within just one single StatefulWidget simply involves declaring each individual piece as its own genuinely separate instance variable on that particular widget's own State class, and a single call to setState can genuinely update several of those separate pieces all together at once within that exact same one single callback, such as properly setting a loading flag back to false while also simultaneously assigning the genuinely newly fetched data, letting Flutter efficiently batch that entire combined set of related changes together into just one single overall rebuild rather than several genuinely separate individual ones.
bool _isLoading = true;
List<Item> _items = [];

void _loadItems() async {
  final items = await fetchItems();
  setState(() {
    _isLoading = false;
    _items = items;
  });
}
Real-world example A product list screen properly manages both a loading flag and its own fetched items list together within one single StatefulWidget, updating both of those related separate pieces together within just one single combined setState call once the actual underlying data genuinely finishes loading.

Common follow-ups: What genuinely happens if you accidentally call setState separately several genuinely separate times in a row rather than combining those related updates together within just one single call?;At what specific point does managing several genuinely separate pieces of local state like this actually start to genuinely become unwieldy?