Going Beyond Dialogs: Creating Top-Notch Flutter Apps with Overlays

A Dialog is great until you need something it can't do: an alert that should appear on top of any screen, a notification banner, a dropdown or pull-down menu that floats above the layout, or a tooltip that follows a widget. This workshop, given at DevFest Stockholm 2025, is about Flutter's Overlay system and how to use it to build those experiences properly.

What the talk covers

• How overlays work. Flutter renders an Overlay above the regular widget tree. Dialogs, menus and tooltips already use it under the hood; you can use it directly with OverlayEntry and OverlayPortal.
• Real-world UI problems overlays solve. Global alerts and notifications, floating menus, onboarding hints and contextual popups that need to escape the normal layout.
• Positioning and lifecycle. Anchoring an overlay to a widget, keeping it in sync when the layout changes, and removing it reliably so it doesn't leak or linger.
• Packages that build on overlays. Community packages such as OverlayPlus and AirBridge, and when a package is worth it versus a small custom solution.

Who it is for

Flutter developers who want their apps to feel polished, and teams building design systems who need consistent, reusable floating UI.

Key takeaways

1. Reach for a dialog for blocking decisions; reach for an overlay for everything that floats.
2. Own the lifecycle of every OverlayEntry.
3. Anchor overlays to widgets, not to hard-coded positions.