Scroll up does not work with SwipeRefreshLayout in Listview

In order for SwipeRefreshLayout to work, it needs to be the direct parent of your ListView, and the ListView should be the first active child view of the SwipeRefreshLayout.

The documentation for SwipeRefreshLayout says that the ListView should be the only child, but it is okay if it has more than one child as long as the ListView is first. This means, for instance, that SwipeRefreshLayout will work fine if you are using an adapter with a view for “empty”. For example:

<android.support.v4.widget.SwipeRefreshLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
    android:id="@+id/swipe_refresh"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    tools:context=".NearbyJobsActivity$PlaceholderFragment">

    <ListView
        android:id="@android:id/list"
        android:layout_width="match_parent"
        android:layout_height="match_parent"
        android:divider="@color/list_divider"
        android:dividerHeight="1dp"
        android:listSelector="@drawable/list_row_selector" />

    <TextView
        android:id="@android:id/empty"
        android:layout_width="match_parent"
        android:layout_height="match_parent"
        android:gravity="center" />

</android.support.v4.widget.SwipeRefreshLayout>

If you can manage this sort of layout, then SwipeRefreshLayout will work fine and you won’t need any of the workarounds listed in other answers.

My own problem was that that I was loading my ListView as a Fragment, so I actually had:

<SwipeRefreshLayout>

    <FrameLayout>           )
         <ListView/>        \ fragment
         <TextView/>        /
    </FrameLayout>          )

</SwipeRefreshLayout>

So the SwipeRefreshLayout was choosing the FrameLayout as it’s “target” and its default canChildScrollUp() implementation was always returning false. Once I moved the SwipeRefreshLayout inside the Fragment, everything started working correctly.

<FrameLayout>

    <SwipeRefreshLayout>    )
         <ListView/>        \ fragment
         <TextView/>        /
    </SwipeRefreshLayout>   )

</FrameLayout>