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())

to

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

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Alternatively, you can opt out of the view-controller based status bar appearance:

Set View controller-based status bar appearance to NO in your Info.plist. Call [[UIApplication sharedApplication] setStatusBarStyle:UIStatusBarStyleLightContent];

Note: This method has been deprecated in iOS9. Use preferredStatusBarStyle on the UIViewController instead. (see Apple Developer Library)

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You can do this without writing any line of code! Do the following to make the status bar text color white through the whole app

On you project plist file:

Status bar style: Transparent black style (alpha of 0.5)

View controller-based status bar appearance: NO

Status bar is initially hidden: NO

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Note: The most upvoted answer does not work for iOS 7 / 8

In Info.plist set 'View controller-based status bar appearance' as NO

In AppDelegate add

[[UIApplication sharedApplication] setStatusBarStyle:UIStatusBarStyleLightContent];

to

- (BOOL)application:(UIApplication *)application didFinishLaunchingWithOptions:(NSDictionary *)launchOptions{
   ...
}    

This solution works for iOS 7 / 8.

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For me, nothing happened with using all the things in the other answers (and from other sources/documentation). What did help was to set the Navigation Bar Style to "Black" in the XIB. This changed the text to white without any code at all.

https://i.stack.imgur.com/NfOK6.png

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None of that worked for me, so here is a working solution...

In Info.plist, add a row:

UIViewControllerBasedStatusBarAppearance, and set the value NO.

Then in AppDelegate in didFinishLaunchingWithOptions, add these rows:

[application setStatusBarHidden:NO];
[application setStatusBarStyle:UIStatusBarStyleLightContent];

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You dont need to do any code for this

https://i.stack.imgur.com/wmTmN.png

& set its value type to Boolean & value to NO. Then click on project settings,then click on General Tab & under Deployment Info set the preferred status bar style to .Light as follows:

https://i.stack.imgur.com/9FLkn.png

Thats it.

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Just two steps as following:

Step 1:

Under the Info tab of the project target, Add Row:

UIViewControllerBasedStatusBarAppearance, set value NO.

Step 2:

In the project AppDelegate.m:

- (BOOL)application:(UIApplication *)application 
        didFinishLaunchingWithOptions:(NSDictionary *)launchOptions{
    …
    [application setStatusBarStyle:UIStatusBarStyleLightContent];
    …
}

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This works in Golden Master iOS 7 and Xcode 5 GM seed and iOS7 SDK released on September 18th, 2013 (at least with navigation controller hidden):

Set the UIViewControllerBasedStatusBarAppearance to NO in the Info.plist. In ViewDidLoad method or anywhere, where do you want to change status bar style: [[UIApplication sharedApplication] setStatusBarStyle:UIStatusBarStyleLightContent];

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In case your UIViewController is inside a UINavigationController you will have to set the BarStyle:

-[UINavigationBar setBarStyle:UIBarStyleBlack]

Original Answer is here

https://devforums.apple.com/message/844264#844264

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If you have an embedded navigation controller created via Interface Builder, be sure to set the following in a class that manages your navigation controller:

-(UIStatusBarStyle)preferredStatusBarStyle{ 
    return UIStatusBarStyleLightContent; 
} 

That should be all you need.

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I'm using Xcode 6 beta 5 on a Swift project, for an iOS 7 app.

Here is what I did, and it works:

info.plist:

https://i.stack.imgur.com/31G46.png

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Go to Project -> Target, Then set Status Bar Style to Light. It makes status-bar white from the launch screen. Then set View controller-based status bar appearance equal to NO in Info.plist.

---

https://i.stack.imgur.com/u4vyC.png

  func application(_ application: UIApplication, didFinishLaunchingWithOptions launchOptions: [UIApplicationLaunchOptionsKey: Any]?) -> Bool {
        // Override point for customization after application launch.
        UIApplication.shared.statusBarStyle = .lightContent
        return true
    }

this has been deprecated in iOS9 now you should do override this property in the rootviewcontroller

doing this has been deprecated in iOS 9 should do this on the rootviewcontroller

override var preferredStatusBarStyle: UIStatusBarStyle {
        return .lightContent
 }

---

In AppDelegate.m, add the following.

- (BOOL)application:(UIApplication *)application didFinishLaunchingWithOptions:(NSDictionary *)launchOptions{

[[UIApplication sharedApplication] setStatusBarStyle:UIStatusBarStyleLightContent];

} 

And in the Plist file, set 'View controller-based status bar appearance' to NO.

---

Simply In App Delegate:

[[UIApplication sharedApplication] setStatusBarStyle:UIStatusBarStyleLightContent];

In Swift 5, Follow the below steps:

Add key UIViewControllerBasedStatusBarAppearance and set value to false in Info.plist Add key UIStatusBarStyle and set value to UIStatusBarStyleLightContent

---

Well, this is really working like a piece of cake for me.

Go to your app's info.plist.

Set View controller-based status bar appearance to NO Set Status bar style to UIStatusBarStyleLightContent

Then go to your app's delegate and paste in the following code where you set your windows's RootViewController.

#define SYSTEM_VERSION_GREATER_THAN_OR_EQUAL_TO(v)  ([[[UIDevice currentDevice] systemVersion] compare:v options:NSNumericSearch] != NSOrderedAscending)

if (SYSTEM_VERSION_GREATER_THAN_OR_EQUAL_TO(@"7.0"))
{
    UIView *view=[[UIView alloc] initWithFrame:CGRectMake(0, 0,320, 20)];
    view.backgroundColor=[UIColor colorWithRed:0/255.0 green:0/255.0 blue:0/255.0 alpha:1.0];
    [self.window.rootViewController.view addSubview:view];
}

Bingo. It's working for me.

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iOS 7 allows individual view controllers to determine the appearance of the status bar, as described by the Apple developer documentation:

iOS 7 gives view controllers the ability to adjust the style of the status bar while the app is running. A good way to change the status bar style dynamically is to implement preferredStatusBarStyle and—within an animation block—update the status bar appearance and call setNeedsStatusBarAppearanceUpdate.

Setting the status bar appearance globally is a two-step process.

First, you need to tell iOS that you don't want to set the status bar appearance on a view-by-view basis.

Then you need to take charge and actually set the new global status bar style.

To disable view-by-view status bar control, you'll need to set the View controller-based status bar appearance property in Info.plist.

Open the Project Navigator and select the project for your iOS app, then select the Info tab.

Hover over a row, then click the plus sign that appears to add a new property to your .plist.

Enter View controller-based status bar appearance in the Key field, then make sure the Type field is set to Boolean. Finally, enter NO in the Value field.

To set a global style for the status bar, add another property under the Info tab with a key of Status bar style, a Type of String and a Value of Opaque black style.

Here's a blog post with a little more detail and some sample code:

http://codebleep.com/setting-the-status-bar-text-color-in-ios-7/

---

Answer updated for for Xcode GM Seed:

In Info.plist put View controller-based status bar appearance as NO In the project, set: In ViewDidLoad: [[UIApplication sharedApplication] setStatusBarStyle:UIStatusBarStyleLightContent];

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Xcode constantly seems to change this, so this is the latest.

As of 2021 - Swift 5, Xcode 12

To change the status bar to white:

Open your Info.plist. Add key UIViewControllerBasedStatusBarAppearance and set value to No (false). The human readable version of this is "View controller-based status bar appearance". Add key UIStatusBarStyle and set value to UIStatusBarStyleLightContent (i.e., "Light Content").

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No need do some extra , just write this code in your viewController and get status bar color white

- (UIStatusBarStyle)preferredStatusBarStyle{return UIStatusBarStyleLightContent;}

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I think all the answers do not really point the problem because all of them work in specific scenarios. But if you need to cover all the cases follow the points bellow:

Depending on where you need the status bar light style you should always have in mind these 3 points:

https://i.stack.imgur.com/lZtBI.png

2) if you have a controller inside a navigation controller You can change it in the interface builder as follows:

https://i.stack.imgur.com/5kKP5.png

b) Then set the style of the navigation bar to "Black", because this means you'll have a "black" -> dark background under your status bar, so it will set the status bar to white

https://i.stack.imgur.com/Dp7xF.png

Or do it in code as follows

navigationController?.navigationBar.barStyle = UIBarStyle.Black

3) If you have the controller alone that needs to have it's own status bar style and it's not embedded in some container structure as a UINavigationController

Set the status bar style in code for the controller:

https://i.stack.imgur.com/no246.png

---

Here is Apple Guidelines/Instruction about status bar change. Only Dark & light (while & black) are allowed in status bar.

Here is - How to change status bar style:

If you want to set status bar style, application level then set UIViewControllerBasedStatusBarAppearance to NO in your `.plist' file.

if you wan to set status bar style, at view controller level then follow these steps:

Set the UIViewControllerBasedStatusBarAppearance to YES in the .plist file, if you need to set status bar style at UIViewController level only. In the viewDidLoad add function - setNeedsStatusBarAppearanceUpdate override preferredStatusBarStyle in your view controller.

-

override func viewDidLoad() {
    super.viewDidLoad()
    self.setNeedsStatusBarAppearanceUpdate()
}

override var preferredStatusBarStyle: UIStatusBarStyle {
    return .lightContent
}

https://i.stack.imgur.com/8sH5i.png

Here is some hacky trick to change/set background color for status bar during application launch or during viewDidLoad of your view controller.

extension UIApplication {

    var statusBarView: UIView? {
        return value(forKey: "statusBar") as? UIView
    }

}

// Set upon application launch, if you've application based status bar
class AppDelegate: UIResponder, UIApplicationDelegate {

    var window: UIWindow?

    func application(_ application: UIApplication, didFinishLaunchingWithOptions launchOptions: [UIApplicationLaunchOptionsKey: Any]?) -> Bool {
        UIApplication.shared.statusBarView?.backgroundColor = UIColor.red
        return true
    }
}


or 
// Set it from your view controller if you've view controller based statusbar
class ViewController: UIViewController {

    override func viewDidLoad() {
        super.viewDidLoad()

        UIApplication.shared.statusBarView?.backgroundColor = UIColor.red
    }

}

Here is result:

https://i.stack.imgur.com/LKppl.png

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Simply calling

[[UINavigationBar appearance] setBarStyle:UIBarStyleBlack];

in the

-(BOOL)application:(UIApplication *)application 
           didFinishLaunchingWithOptions:(NSDictionary *)launchOptions {
}

method of my AppDelegate works great for me in iOS7.

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This is documented in the iOS 7 UI Transition Guide, which you need an Apple developer ID to access directly. The relevant excerpt:

Because the status bar is transparent, the view behind it shows through. [...] Use a UIStatusBarStyle constant to specify whether the statusbar content should be dark or light: UIStatusBarStyleDefault displays dark content. [...] UIStatusBarStyleLightContent displays light content. Use when dark content is behind the status bar.

Also possibly of interest:

In iOS 7, you can control the style of the status bar from an individual vew controller and change it while the app runs. To opt in to this behavior, add the UIViewControllerBasedStatusBarAppearance key to an app's Info.plist file and give it the value YES.

I'd definitely recommend having a look through the document, which, again, you can access with your Apple developer ID.

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In my case for Swift 5, I added these lines:

override func viewDidAppear(_ animated: Bool) {
    navigationController?.navigationBar.barStyle = .black
}

override var preferredStatusBarStyle: UIStatusBarStyle {
    return .lightContent
}

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I did some things different and it works for me.

With no changes in code, I did config my .plist file like this:

View controller-based status bar appearance > NO

Status bar style > UIStatusBarStyleLightContent (simple string)

I hope it helps.

edit

For each view controller I change the "status bar"'s Simulated Metrics property, in storyboard, from "inferred" to "Light Content"

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in info.plist set the field value NO View controller-based status bar appearance and set statusbar style light in target > general setting.

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If you want the same result with Swift, you can use this code in your AppDelegate.swift file :

UINavigationBar.appearance().barStyle = .BlackTranslucent

And the text of your status bar will be white :-) !

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Just to summarize, edit your project Info.plist and add:

View controller-based status bar appearance : NO

Status bar style : Opaque black style

or if you have raw key/value plist

UIViewControllerBasedStatusBarAppearance : NO

UIStatusBarStyle : Opaque black style

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