Is there a way to change the height of a UIToolbar?

Question

I've got an UIToolbar in Interface Builder and I've noticed that it's locked to being 44px tall. Of course I'd like to make this larger.

Does Apple allow resizing of this control? If so, how do I go about it?

Orthopedics

Answer 1

Sure, just set its frame differently:

[myToolbar setFrame:CGRectMake(0, 50, 320, 35)];

This will make your toolbar 35 pixels tall. Of course this requires an IBOutlet or creating the UIToolbar programmatically, but that's very easy to do.

Tithing

Will resizing UIToolbar be rejected from AppStore? – Smallclothes

Nope, I tried and got trough. But sometimes it is up to the daily mood of your apple guy. – Brasilein

I don't like this solution because it causes the tool bar to be resized on appearance transitions. The sizeThatFits solution below works best – Demit

Does not work on latest iOS, answer is completely wrong – Narrate

Answer 2

If that does not work in SDK 6, it is possible to solve as below:

Select the toolbar element and choose Editor > Pin > Height to create a constraint. Go to your View Controller Scene and select the created Height(44) constraint, then put the value you want.

Mussman

I am so glad I found this comment, I wish I could up vote you a thousand times more. Spent wayyyyy to much time trying to figure this out in code. – Sisneros

xcode 8 has this capability. Not sure what happened between the diff versions. – Ludewig

Where is it located now in later versions? I don't see it under editor – Beaverette

Answer 3

I found that if I set the frame on the iPad, when hiding/showing the Toolbar would reset itself back to a height of 44 pixels. I ended up having to override UIToolbar and change the method:

// return 'best' size to fit given size. does not actually resize view. Default is return existing view size
- (CGSize)sizeThatFits:(CGSize)size {
    CGSize result = [super sizeThatFits:size];
    result.height = 55;
    return result;
};     

This would correct adjust the height even with the hide/show.

Moxley

I found that when I have an odd value for height (in non-retina resolution), the origin is shifted by 0.5 pixels. I had to correct navbar and toolbar's frames in viewDidLoad method of VCs – Libbielibbna

@Ege, can you elaborate more? – Lanita

Sure @MarqueIV, I override sizeThatFits for custom height of a Navigation bar (not toolbar) and found out that when I have a height that is not a multiple of 4 points, when I hide the navigation bar and re-display it, its origin's y value is 0.5 instead of 0. I do not experience this behaviour when I have a custom height value that is a multiple of 4 – Libbielibbna

@Ege What? You cannot set the points value directly. Unless you use .5 increments.. – Caulicle

@MaciejSwic I don't follow what you're trying to say. y value becomes 0.5, I don't set it automatically – Libbielibbna

@EgeAkpinar What did you end up doing about this 0.5 discrepancy? – Gandzha

If you want to change toolbar height as the device rotates (as is iOS default now), you can add something like: result.height = UIInterfaceOrientationIsPortrait([UIApplication sharedApplication].statusBarOrientation) ? 55 : 40; – Lurcher

This seems to be the only method that also works for iOS 12, where toolbars have a larger default height on the iPad. I use it to set the default height back to 44.0. – Terbia

Answer 4

In iOS 6, with autolayout, the simplest approach is a UIToolbar subclass in which you override instrinsicContentSize. Here's code from one my apps, where the toolbar is tall. Its sides and bottom are pinned to the sides and bottom of the superview as usual.

-(CGSize)intrinsicContentSize {
    return CGSizeMake(UIViewNoIntrinsicMetric, 85);
}

Colquitt

I like your solution. I'm using the built in toolbar on UINavigationController, so I can't subclass. Instead I swizzled intrinsicContentSize on UIToolbar and returned my desired height. – Demit

@KyleRedfearn "I'm using the built in toolbar on UINavigationController, so I can't subclass" Not true. initWithNavigationBarClass:toolbarClass: lets you use a UIToolbar subclass with your navigation controller. – Colquitt

Oh yeah. I had forgotten about the initializer. Thanks! – Demit

Answer 5

For Xcode 7.1 iOS 9, in auto layout, the size is locked to 44px. The Xcode menu option Editor > Pin > Height is not there, instead do the following action:

In InterfaceBuilder, click the toolbar element to select it. Control+Drag down anywhere in the toolbar and release, a popup menu will display showing the option "Height" at the top, select it.

You now have a Height constraint to work with and adjust as necessary.

Hydride

Great, Clean, Simple. – Fallible

I don't think this works with a toolbar in a UINavigationController. – Gandzha

Though I was able to change the height using this method, it affected the way the toolbar appeared on the view. For a fraction of second, it appeared few pixels above it's targeted location. – Breaux

Answer 6

You could also just edit the xib file:

open it as source code and find the entry that defines the frame for the UIToolbar, something along the lines of

<string key="NSFrame">{{0,420}, {320,44}}</string>

and just change the value for 44 to whatever size you need.

This way the toolbar will be taller, and in InterfaceBuilder you'll see the new size grayed out and you'll be unable to change it, but you don't need any outlets or code.

Propolis

This does not seem to work any more. Tested this just now on XCode 5.1.1 for a storyboard using iOS7 styling. The values are being reset to their defaults. – Hargrave

actually works for ios10 swift and the line you need to look for is <constraint firstAttribute="height" constant="80" id="fZW-ej-FYO"/> – Araroba

This worked spot on for me using a custom Xib, note for IOS13 height can now be found in this line: <rect key="frame" x="0.0" y="0.0" width="187" height="57"/> – Sooty

Answer 7

As long as you have a height constraint on the toolbar you can use this little snippet that has helped me adjust heights for classes that inherit from UIView

-(void)setHeightConstraintTo:(CGFloat)height forView:(UIView *)view{
    NSPredicate *predicate = [NSPredicate predicateWithFormat:@"firstAttribute = %d",          NSLayoutAttributeHeight];
    NSArray *filteredArray = [view.constraints filteredArrayUsingPredicate:predicate];
    if(filteredArray.count > 0){
        NSLayoutConstraint *constraint = filteredArray.firstObject;
        constraint.constant = height;
    }
 }

Postulant

Answer 8

I'm not sure how this would sit with Apple - and of course it depends how you wish to use the toolbar - but you can add a default UIView and change its class in the property inspector to UIToolbar. This gives you transparency and customisability (in this case height) for free, at the expense of the layout of bar button items.

Vesuvius

Answer 9

Swift Solution:

myToolbar.frame = CGRect(x: myToolbar.frame.origin.x, y: myToolbar.frame.origin.y, width: myToolbar.frame.size.width, height: 20)

The CGRectMake is obsolete. This can be replaced with the CGRect. This will set the height of the toolbar to 20. The same works for Segmented control as well.

Voorhees

Answer 10

In interface builder, there is also the possibility to use "User Defined Runtime Attributes".

Simply add an entry with keypath set to "frame" of type "Rect" and set the value you want.

Glycoside