How to get line count of textview before rendering?

The accepted answer doesn’t work when a whole word is placed on the next line in order to avoid breaking the word:

|hello   |
|world!  |

The only way to be 100% sure about the number of lines is to use the same text flow engine that TextView uses. Since TextView doesn’t share its re-flow logic here’s a custom string processor which splits text into multiple lines each of which fits the given width. It also does its best to not break the words unless the whole word does not fit:

public List<String> splitWordsIntoStringsThatFit(String source, float maxWidthPx, Paint paint) {
    ArrayList<String> result = new ArrayList<>();

    ArrayList<String> currentLine = new ArrayList<>();

    String[] sources = source.split("\\s");
    for(String chunk : sources) {
        if(paint.measureText(chunk) < maxWidthPx) {
            processFitChunk(maxWidthPx, paint, result, currentLine, chunk);
        } else {
            //the chunk is too big, split it.
            List<String> splitChunk = splitIntoStringsThatFit(chunk, maxWidthPx, paint);
            for(String chunkChunk : splitChunk) {
                processFitChunk(maxWidthPx, paint, result, currentLine, chunkChunk);
            }
        }
    }

    if(! currentLine.isEmpty()) {
        result.add(TextUtils.join(" ", currentLine));
    }
    return result;
}

/**
 * Splits a string to multiple strings each of which does not exceed the width
 * of maxWidthPx.
 */
private List<String> splitIntoStringsThatFit(String source, float maxWidthPx, Paint paint) {
    if(TextUtils.isEmpty(source) || paint.measureText(source) <= maxWidthPx) {
        return Arrays.asList(source);
    }

    ArrayList<String> result = new ArrayList<>();
    int start = 0;
    for(int i = 1; i <= source.length(); i++) {
        String substr = source.substring(start, i);
        if(paint.measureText(substr) >= maxWidthPx) {
            //this one doesn't fit, take the previous one which fits
            String fits = source.substring(start, i - 1);
            result.add(fits);
            start = i - 1;
        }
        if (i == source.length()) {
            String fits = source.substring(start, i);
            result.add(fits);
        }
    }

    return result;
}

/**
 * Processes the chunk which does not exceed maxWidth.
 */
private void processFitChunk(float maxWidth, Paint paint, ArrayList<String> result, ArrayList<String> currentLine, String chunk) {
    currentLine.add(chunk);
    String currentLineStr = TextUtils.join(" ", currentLine);
    if (paint.measureText(currentLineStr) >= maxWidth) {
        //remove chunk
        currentLine.remove(currentLine.size() - 1);
        result.add(TextUtils.join(" ", currentLine));
        currentLine.clear();
        //ok because chunk fits
        currentLine.add(chunk);
    }
}

Here’s a part of a unit test:

    String text = "Hello this is a very long and meanless chunk: abcdefghijkonetuhosnahrc.pgraoneuhnotehurc.pgansohtunsaohtu. Hope you like it!";
    Paint paint = new Paint();
    paint.setTextSize(30);
    paint.setTypeface(Typeface.DEFAULT_BOLD);

    List<String> strings = splitWordsIntoStringsThatFit(text, 50, paint);
    assertEquals(3, strings.size());
    assertEquals("Hello this is a very long and meanless chunk:", strings.get(0));
    assertEquals("abcdefghijkonetuhosnahrc.pgraoneuhnotehurc.pganso", strings.get(1));
    assertEquals("htunsaohtu. Hope you like it!", strings.get(2));

Now one can be 100% sure about the line count in TextView without a need to render it:

TextView textView = ...         //text view must be of fixed width

Paint paint = new Paint();
paint.setTextSize(yourTextViewTextSizePx);
paint.setTypeface(yourTextViewTypeface);

float textViewWidthPx = ...;

List<String> strings = splitWordsIntoStringsThatFit(yourText, textViewWidthPx, paint);
textView.setText(TextUtils.join("\n", strings);

int lineCount = strings.size();        //will be the same as textView.getLineCount()