IOS 11 customise search bar in navigation bar

iosswiftuinavigationbaruisearchbar

I want to change the color of the text and icon in the iOS 11 searchbar when it is embedded in the navigation bar. So placeholder text, search text and search icon.

if #available(iOS 11.0, *) {
    navigationController?.navigationBar.prefersLargeTitles = false
    let searchController = UISearchController(searchResultsController: nil)
    navigationItem.searchController = searchController
    navigationItem.hidesSearchBarWhenScrolling = false

    searchController.searchBar.placeholder = "Suchen"
    searchController.searchBar.tintColor = .white
}

As you can see in the image, the text is grey on a deep blue background, which looks ugly. I want to text and icon to be at least white. (changing the blue background color also does not work really good, see my other question)

The only thing which works is changing the color of the blinking cursor and the "cancel" button, which is done with the .tintColor property.

Solutions which seems to work in iOS 10 and below seem not work anymore in iOS 11, so please post only solutions which you know working in iOS 11. Thanks.

Maybe I miss the point about this "automatic styling" in iOS 11. Any help is appreciated.

Best Answer

I just found out how to set also the rest of them: (with some help of Brandon, thanks!)

The "Cancel" text:

searchController.searchBar.tintColor = .white

The search icon:

searchController.searchBar.setImage(UIImage(named: "my_search_icon"), for: UISearchBarIcon.search, state: .normal)

The clear icon:

searchController.searchBar.setImage(UIImage(named: "my_search_icon"), for: UISearchBarIcon.clear, state: .normal)

The search text:

UITextField.appearance(whenContainedInInstancesOf: [UISearchBar.self]).defaultTextAttributes = [NSAttributedStringKey.foregroundColor.rawValue: UIColor.white]

Thanks for the help @Brandon!

The placeholder:

UITextField.appearance(whenContainedInInstancesOf: [UISearchBar.self]).attributedPlaceholder = NSAttributedString(string: "placeholder", attributes: [NSAttributedStringKey.foregroundColor: UIColor.white])

The white background:

let searchController = UISearchController(searchResultsController: nil)
searchController.delegate = self

let searchBar = searchController.searchBar
searchBar.tintColor = UIColor.white
searchBar.barTintColor = UIColor.white

if let textfield = searchBar.value(forKey: "searchField") as? UITextField {
    textfield.textColor = UIColor.blue
    if let backgroundview = textfield.subviews.first {

        // Background color
        backgroundview.backgroundColor = UIColor.white

        // Rounded corner
        backgroundview.layer.cornerRadius = 10;
        backgroundview.clipsToBounds = true;
    }
}

if let navigationbar = self.navigationController?.navigationBar {
    navigationbar.barTintColor = UIColor.blue
}

navigationItem.searchController = searchController
navigationItem.hidesSearchBarWhenScrolling = false

Taken from here.

Related Solutions

Ios – Status bar and navigation bar appear over the view’s bounds in iOS 7

You can achieve this by implementing a new property called edgesForExtendedLayout in iOS7 SDK. Please add the following code to achieve this,

if ([self respondsToSelector:@selector(edgesForExtendedLayout)])
        self.edgesForExtendedLayout = UIRectEdgeNone;

You need to add the above in your -(void)viewDidLoad method.

iOS 7 brings several changes to how you layout and customize the appearance of your UI. The changes in view-controller layout, tint color, and font affect all the UIKit objects in your app. In addition, enhancements to gesture recognizer APIs give you finer grained control over gesture interactions.

Using View Controllers

In iOS 7, view controllers use full-screen layout. At the same time, iOS 7 gives you more granular control over the way a view controller lays out its views. In particular, the concept of full-screen layout has been refined to let a view controller specify the layout of each edge of its view.

The wantsFullScreenLayout view controller property is deprecated in iOS 7. If you currently specify wantsFullScreenLayout = NO, the view controller may display its content at an unexpected screen location when it runs in iOS 7.

To adjust how a view controller lays out its views, UIViewController provides the following properties:

edgesForExtendedLayout

The edgesForExtendedLayout property uses the UIRectEdge type, which specifies each of a rectangle’s four edges, in addition to specifying none and all. Use edgesForExtendedLayout to specify which edges of a view should be extended, regardless of bar translucency. By default, the value of this property is UIRectEdgeAll.

extendedLayoutIncludesOpaqueBars

If your design uses opaque bars, refine edgesForExtendedLayout by also setting the extendedLayoutIncludesOpaqueBars property to NO. (The default value of extendedLayoutIncludesOpaqueBars is NO.)

automaticallyAdjustsScrollViewInsets

If you don’t want a scroll view’s content insets to be automatically adjusted, set automaticallyAdjustsScrollViewInsets to NO. (The default value of automaticallyAdjustsScrollViewInsets is YES.)

topLayoutGuide, bottomLayoutGuide

The topLayoutGuide and bottomLayoutGuide properties indicate the location of the top or bottom bar edges in a view controller’s view. If bars should overlap the top or bottom of a view, you can use Interface Builder to position the view relative to the bar by creating constraints to the bottom of topLayoutGuide or to the top of bottomLayoutGuide. (If no bars should overlap the view, the bottom of topLayoutGuide is the same as the top of the view and the top of bottomLayoutGuide is the same as the bottom of the view.) Both properties are lazily created when requested.

Please refer, apple doc

Ios – How to change Status Bar text color in iOS

Set the UIViewControllerBasedStatusBarAppearance to YES in the .plist file.
In the viewDidLoad do a [self setNeedsStatusBarAppearanceUpdate];

Add the following method:

- (UIStatusBarStyle)preferredStatusBarStyle
{ 
    return UIStatusBarStyleLightContent; 
}

Note: This does not work for controllers inside UINavigationController, please see Tyson's comment below :)

Swift 3 - This will work controllers inside UINavigationController. Add this code inside your controller.

// Preferred status bar style lightContent to use on dark background.
// Swift 3
override var preferredStatusBarStyle: UIStatusBarStyle {
    return .lightContent
}

Swift 5 and SwiftUI

For SwiftUI create a new swift file called HostingController.swift

import Foundation
import UIKit
import SwiftUI

class HostingController: UIHostingController<ContentView> {
    override var preferredStatusBarStyle: UIStatusBarStyle {
        return .lightContent
    }
}

Then change the following lines of code in the SceneDelegate.swift

window.rootViewController = UIHostingController(rootView: ContentView())

window.rootViewController = HostingController(rootView: ContentView())

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Ios – Status bar and navigation bar appear over the view’s bounds in iOS 7

Ios – How to change Status Bar text color in iOS

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