Time needed: 30-35 minutes
What you'll do: Build an amazing Surprise App that will wow your friends! You'll create an app with hidden surprises - tap a button and watch the magic happen with changing images and fun sound effects! 🎊🔊
✅ Have MIT App Inventor open in your browser
✅ Prepare 2 fun images (one normal, one surprise!)
✅ Find a cool sound effect for your surprise
✅ Think about what surprise you want to create
✅ Get ready to amaze people with your app!
Follow along with this awesome tutorial:

Sample UI |
Components Needed |
 |
Layout Components: • Vertical Arrangement • Horizontal Arrangement Visible Components: • Image • Label • Buttons Non-visible Components: • Sound |
Create Your Project
- Open MIT App Inventor
- Create a new project
- Name it "Surprise App"
- One Image Component - For displaying pictures
- One Label Component - For instruction text
- 2 Button Components - For user interaction
-
Arrange Components
- Organize components with proper alignment
- Use vertical and horizontal arrangements for clean layout
-
Configure Buttons
- Rename both buttons in the Properties section
- Also rename them in the Components panel
- Give them meaningful names (e.g., "Surprise_Button", "Back_Button")
-
Set Up Content
- Write clear instruction text in the label
- Add your main image to the image component
- Resize the image to fit nicely
-
Prepare Surprise Element
- Upload a second image to your media files
- This will be your "surprise" image
- Choose something fun and unexpected!
When Surprise Button is Clicked:
-
Change the Image
- Switch to your surprise image
- Create that "wow" moment for users
-
Add Sound Effect
- Play an exciting sound
- Enhance the surprise experience
When Back Button is Clicked:
-
Reset the Image
- Return to the original image
- Prepare for the next surprise
-
Stop the Sound
- End the audio playback
- Return to quiet state
- Interactive Interface - Responsive buttons and visual feedback
- Image Switching - Dynamic content changes
- Sound Integration - Audio enhancement for better user experience
- User-Friendly Design - Clean and intuitive layout
After completing this tutorial, you will understand:
- Basic app layout and component arrangement
- Event-driven programming (button clicks)
- Media management (images and sounds)
- User interface design principles
- App testing and functionality
Make your Surprise App even more amazing:
- Add multiple surprise images that change randomly
- Create different sound effects for each surprise
- Add animation effects when the image changes
- Make the surprise button change colors
- Add a counter showing how many times the surprise was triggered
Before showing it to friends, make sure:
✅ The surprise button changes the image
✅ The sound plays when you tap surprise
✅ The back button returns to the original image
✅ The sound stops when you tap back
✅ Everything looks good on your phone screen
💡 Tip
Test your app multiple times! Sometimes bugs only appear after using the app several times. Real app developers test everything thoroughly!
You just learned about:
- Visible components (things users can see like buttons and images)
- Non-visible components (things that work behind the scenes like sounds)
- How to make apps interactive and fun
- The importance of surprising and delighting your users!
Awesome work creating your Surprise App! 🎉
When you've created an amazing Surprise App, share it with your teacher and classmates!