SwiftUI: NavigationLink causes unwanted padding in minimal 10-line-example

Question

When wrapping views in a NavigationLink to create a Master-Detail flow, the NavigationLink appears to add padding (red) that I don't want.

If I comment out the NavigationLink, everything looks correct (picture on the right). That however of course makes my views unclickable.

What can I do to remove the red padding that occurs when I render this on the Watch?

This is the code that I run:

struct ContentView: View {
    
    let testArray = [1,2,3,4,5]
    
    var body: some View {
        
        ScrollView {
            VStack {
                ForEach(testArray, id: \.self) { element in
                    
                    NavigationLink(destination: Text("")) {
                        Text("BB . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .")
                            .font(.title3)
                            .foregroundColor(.white)
                            .background(Color.blue)
                    }.background(Color.red) //has all the unwanted padding
                    
                }
            }.background(Color.black)
        }.background(Color.gray)
    }
}

I found a few good hints at How to show NavigationLink as a button in SwiftUI however doing ZStack/.background tricks only leaves a ~30px strip that is clickable, it does not fill the whole ZStack in that case.

I figured out the padding seems to be a static 8px. So what I'm doing now is .padding(.all, -8) hoping for a better solution to come

Ocher

Answer 1

Apply .buttonStyle(PlainButtonStyle()) to your NavigationLink to remove the padding and background. You’ll also lose a button’s default styling, obviously, so you’ll have to recreate it if you want it.

Inkster

For some reason this makes the view half-transparent in the preview but it works in the actual app, thank you – Ocher

Nope. This did not work. same result as OP – Gaal

Genius. FYI this also works for the simple Link view which is what I was looking to remove the padding of developer.apple.com/documentation/swiftui/link – Almire

Answer 2

To take away the unwanted border introduced by the NavigationLink, simply apply buttonStyle as plain to the NavigationLink like so:

NavigationLink(destination: DestinationView()) {
                            ExtractedView()
                        }.buttonStyle(.plain)

Wimsatt

Answer 3

@Adam 's solution seems to doesn't be enough. Try the following code:

NavigationLink(destination: Text("")) {
         Text("Dummy Text")
           .font(.title3)
           .foregroundColor(.white)
           .background(Color.blue)
     }
     .buttonStyle(.plain)
     .listRowInsets(EdgeInsets())

Chintz