How to change the color of Action Bar in an Android App?

Namachila 3 weeks ago

0 1 1 minute read

In this article, you will learn how to change the colour of the Action Bar in an Android App.

There are two ways to change color.

By changing styles.xml file:

Just go to res/values/styles.xml file
edit the xml file to change the color of action bar.
Code for styles.xml is given below

styles.xml

<resources>
  
    <!-- Base application theme. -->
    <style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.AppCompat.Light.DarkActionBar">
        <!-- Customize your theme here. -->
        <!-- This code is for changing the color of the bar. -->
        <!-- Type your colour code which you want to set in colorPrimary item -->
        <item name="colorPrimary">#0F9D58</item>
        <item name="colorPrimaryDark">@color/colorPrimaryDark</item>
        <item name="colorAccent">@color/colorAccent</item>
    </style>
    <style name="AppTheme.NoActionBar">
        <item name="windowActionBar">false</item>
        <item name="windowNoTitle">true</item>
    </style>
    <!-- Define other styles to fix theme -->
    <style name="AppTheme.AppBarOverlay" parent="ThemeOverlay.AppCompat.Dark.ActionBar" />
    <style name="AppTheme.PopupOverlay" parent="ThemeOverlay.AppCompat.Light" />
</resources>

activity_main.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
  
<!--Relative Layout-->
<RelativeLayout
    xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    android:id="@+id/relativelayout">
  
    <!--Text View-->
   <TextView
       android:layout_width="wrap_content"
       android:layout_height="wrap_content"
       android:id="@+id/textview"
       android:textColor="#0F9D58"
       android:textSize="32dp"
       android:layout_centerInParent="true"/>
</RelativeLayout>

MainActivity.java

package com.zambiatek.changecolor;
import android.widget.TextView;
import android.support.v7.app.AppCompatActivity;
  
public class MainActivity extends AppCompatActivity {
    @Override
    protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState)
    {
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
        setContentView(R.layout.activity_main);
        // Define text View
        TextView t = findViewById(R.id.textview);
        t.setText("Geeks for Geeks");
    }
}

Through Java file by defining ActionBar object:

Define object for ActionBar and colorDrawable class
set color using setBackgroundDrawable function with colorDrawable object as its parameter.
Here is complete code for MainActivity.java

MainActivity.java

package com.zambiatek.changecolor;
  
import android.support.v7.app.ActionBar;
import android.graphics.Color;
import android.graphics.drawable.ColorDrawable;
import android.support.v7.app.AppCompatActivity;
  
public class MainActivity extends AppCompatActivity {
  
    @Override
    protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState)
    {
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
        setContentView(R.layout.activity_main);
  
        // Define ActionBar object
        ActionBar actionBar;
        actionBar = getSupportActionBar();
  
        // Define ColorDrawable object and parse color
        // using parseColor method
        // with color hash code as its parameter
        ColorDrawable colorDrawable
            = new ColorDrawable(Color.parseColor("#0F9D58"));
  
        // Set BackgroundDrawable
        actionBar.setBackgroundDrawable(colorDrawable);
    }
}

activity_main.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
  
<!--Relative Layout-->
<RelativeLayout 
    xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    android:id="@+id/relativelayout">
  
    <!--Text View-->
   <TextView
       android:layout_width="wrap_content"
       android:layout_height="wrap_content"
       android:textColor="#0F9D58"
       android:textSize="30dp"
       android:text="Geeks for Geeks"
       android:layout_centerInParent="true"/>
</RelativeLayout>