How to stop unwanted UIButton animation on title change?

Question

In iOS 7 my UIButton titles are animating in and out at the wrong time - late. This problem does not appear on iOS 6. I'm just using:

[self setTitle:text forState:UIControlStateNormal];

I would prefer this happens instantly and without a blank frame. This blink is especially distracting and draws attention away from other animations.

We're experiencing this as well. Not sure if it's a iOS7 bug or something we should fix. — Sway, Sep 22 '13 at 22:50
Thanks for these ideas. I tried setHighlighted:NO, but no luck there. I am able to reduce the blink by placing setTitle inside: [UIView animateWithDuration:0.0f animations:^{ ... }]; — exsulto, Sep 23 '13 at 13:48
You can use this workaround in some cases: `self.button.titleLabel.text = text`. But this don't resize label frame and don't work with UIControlStates correctly — zxcat, Oct 08 '13 at 11:58
That's a clever workaround. I'll play with this and see what happens, unfortunately I'm using UIControlStates. — exsulto, Oct 09 '13 at 14:46
only answer from dubenko worked for me: stackoverflow.com/questions/18946490/how-to-stop-unwanted-uibutton-animation-on-title-change#23212964 — samir105, Oct 12 '14 at 05:21

score 276 · Answer 1 · edited Jun 28 '15 at 18:35

276

Use the performWithoutAnimation: method and then force layout to happen immediately instead of later on.

[UIView performWithoutAnimation:^{
  [self.myButton setTitle:text forState:UIControlStateNormal];
  [self.myButton layoutIfNeeded];
}];

edited Jun 28 '15 at 18:35

Abhi Beckert

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answered Feb 28 '14 at 17:19

Snowman

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This works as well as the accepted answer, but seems nicer because it is more encapsulated - it is impossible to forget to add the [UIView setAnimationsEnabled:YES], or for it to get removed down the track. – siburb Jun 12 '14 at 06:51
19

It works for system buttons if you call `[button layoutIfNeeded];` inside the block. – Alexandre Blin Mar 03 '15 at 08:10
1

BTW, for system buttons, layoutIfNeed should be called **after** text changed – YON May 06 '15 at 13:56
This is the best solution! Cheers – sachadso Jan 14 '16 at 11:31
This is correct one for me. It's most voted and on 6th place. Nice... – solgar May 06 '20 at 06:26

score 166 · Accepted Answer · edited Mar 21 '16 at 13:53

166

This works for custom buttons:

[UIView setAnimationsEnabled:NO];
[_button setTitle:@"title" forState:UIControlStateNormal];
[UIView setAnimationsEnabled:YES];

For system buttons you need to add this before re-enabling animations (thank you @Klaas):

[_button layoutIfNeeded];

edited Mar 21 '16 at 13:53

Liau Jian Jie

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answered Oct 10 '13 at 18:42

Jacob K

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This fix eliminates the blink completely - nice. – exsulto Oct 12 '13 at 15:09
13

Unfortunately this doesn't seem to work. Neither does performWithoutAnimation – Sway Oct 24 '13 at 22:23
9

Ok, so the fix that worked in the end was to leave the original UIButton text blank so that when I set it with code it doesn't trigger the animation. – Sway Oct 24 '13 at 22:27
30

This works only if you set the button's type to custom, as per this answer http://stackoverflow.com/a/20718467/62. – Liron Yahdav Feb 25 '14 at 01:39
15

As of iOS 7.1 I had to add `[_button layoutIfNeeded];` – Klaas May 19 '14 at 15:17
6

@LironYahdav if you have the button type set to UIButtonTypeCustom, then this answer is not required. – DonnaLea May 23 '14 at 00:35
@Klaas post it as answer. It works for system buttons! – orkenstein Oct 03 '14 at 14:56
@orkenstein Maybe we are better of when Jacob adds it to his answer? – Klaas Oct 03 '14 at 23:34
even adding layoutifneeded doesn't work for me (ios 8 xcode 6, custom keyboard extension) – samir105 Oct 12 '14 at 05:04
3

layoutIfNeeded works on iOS8 iff you do layout inside no animations block (i.e. disable animations, set title, layout, enable animations) – Farcaller Feb 04 '15 at 13:36
2

Simple just Change button type from system to custom – Sunny Shah Jun 04 '15 at 08:50
@SidShah when? Add more info to your comment – Dima Deplov Jun 04 '15 at 21:29
4

this worked for me [UIView setAnimationsEnabled: NO]; [self.button setTitle: text forState: UIControlStateNormal]; [self.button layoutIfNeeded]; [UIView setAnimationsEnabled: YES]; – Nav Jun 12 '15 at 10:05
Adding a layoutIfNeeded in the case of using multiple buttons in a view adds a *significant* performance overhead, beware. – Marc Etcheverry Dec 18 '18 at 20:31

Paulw11 · Answer 3 · 2017-08-07T02:15:38.390

95

In Swift you can use :

UIView.performWithoutAnimation {
    self.someButtonButton.setTitle(newTitle, forState: .normal)
    self.someButtonButton.layoutIfNeeded()
}

edited Aug 07 '17 at 02:15

answered Dec 09 '15 at 00:43

Paulw11

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This was by far the easiest method. And thank you for including a swift answer btw – simplexity Mar 10 '16 at 15:28
1

Best answer for Swift! – Nubaslon Jun 02 '17 at 11:08
Had an annoying bug where changing a UIButton title while offscreen would cause weird animation timings with interactivePopGestureRecognizer and this solved it. I still think it's a bug with the OS though – SparkyRobinson Aug 07 '17 at 02:05
Strange that .layoutIfNeeded() has to be called, but I tested it both ways in Swift 5 and it definitely still animates without it. – wildcat12 Nov 08 '19 at 14:08
3

Not really. If you don't call `layoutIfNeeded()` then the button is flagged as needing to be redrawn but this won't happen until the next layout pass, which will be outside the `performWithoutAnimation` – Paulw11 Nov 08 '19 at 18:57

Christos Chadjikyriacou · Answer 4 · 2015-05-21T12:19:33.917

91

Change button type to custom form interface builder.

enter image description here

This worked for me.

edited May 21 '15 at 12:19

answered Apr 08 '15 at 08:21

Christos Chadjikyriacou

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Best solution! Thank you. – Thomás Pereira Jul 15 '16 at 12:58
4

But this also disable animation on click button. I want only disable animation on showing button. – Piotr Wasilewicz Apr 12 '17 at 07:06
This works if you don't care about the animation when the button is tapped. – Joaquin Pereira Aug 17 '17 at 18:28
I've had a couple of buttons set like this and obviously this is the most elegant answer for my case. Nice, thanks! – Zoltán Aug 03 '19 at 09:37

score 61 · Answer 5 · answered Dec 21 '13 at 11:24

61

Please note :

when "buttonType" of _button is "UIButtonTypeSystem", below code is invalid：

[UIView setAnimationsEnabled:NO];
[_button setTitle:@"title" forState:UIControlStateNormal];
[UIView setAnimationsEnabled:YES];

when "buttonType" of _button is "UIButtonTypeCustom", above code is valid.

answered Dec 21 '13 at 11:24

shede333

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Can't believe how much time I spent before figuring out you just need to change the button type... ugh... – Sandy Chapman Sep 10 '16 at 03:15
Works without any code. Change only buttons type and it'll work. – Alex Motor Feb 16 '19 at 09:03

score 53 · Answer 6 · answered Apr 22 '14 at 20:52

53

Starting in iOS 7.1 the only solution that worked for me was initializing the button with type UIButtonTypeCustom.

answered Apr 22 '14 at 20:52

Norbert

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This is the most sensible approach for anyone that doesn't require UIButtonTypeSystem. – DonnaLea May 23 '14 at 00:33
This ended up working best for me, I just created a CUSTOM button and made it look and highlight like a system button. Can hardly see the difference but you don't have that delay. – Travis M. Jun 27 '14 at 18:20

score 20 · Answer 7 · answered Jul 05 '19 at 21:15

20

Swift 5

myButton.titleLabel?.text = "title"
myButton.setTitle("title", for: .normal)

answered Jul 05 '19 at 21:15

Carter Randall

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No idea why this works but it does and it's the cleanest solution. UIKit is weird. – Nathan Hosselton Jan 07 '20 at 17:11
no, its not a clean solution, but its quite dirty, as this may change with any iOS – Peter Lapisu Jan 29 '21 at 16:03
@NathanHosselton see dubenko's answer on Apr 22'14. "in first we change title for button, then resize button for this title" – Brian Hong Feb 04 '21 at 00:24

score 18 · Answer 8 · answered Apr 22 '14 at 07:15

18

so i find worked solution:

_logoutButton.titleLabel.text = NSLocalizedString(@"Logout",);
[_logoutButton setTitle:_logoutButton.titleLabel.text forState:UIControlStateNormal];

in first we change title for button, then resize button for this title

answered Apr 22 '14 at 07:15

dubenko

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1

I use the same workaround. The accepted answer doesn't work for me. – deej Aug 10 '14 at 14:52
This causes the title to flash twice, at least with iOS 8. – Jordan H Dec 27 '14 at 05:03
1

This works for me in both 7.1 and 8.1 without flashing. Simple and effective. – Todd Feb 10 '15 at 04:24
Works perfectly in iOS 11, although I had to use the same string again for the second line (using the button label's title caused it to blink). – SilverWolf Apr 19 '18 at 16:42

Xhacker Liu · Answer 9 · 2017-05-22T02:03:17.843

14

I’ve made a Swift extension to do this:

extension UIButton {
    func setTitleWithoutAnimation(title: String?) {
        UIView.setAnimationsEnabled(false)

        setTitle(title, forState: .Normal)

        layoutIfNeeded()
        UIView.setAnimationsEnabled(true)
    }
}

Works for me on iOS 8 and 9, with UIButtonTypeSystem.

(The code is for Swift 2, Swift 3 and Objective-C should be similar)

edited May 22 '17 at 02:03

answered Jul 30 '15 at 22:22

Xhacker Liu

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Not going to use it now but very handy to have around! – Francis Reynolds Aug 24 '16 at 01:33

score 13 · Answer 10 · answered Feb 10 '16 at 09:29

13

Set the button type to UIButtonTypeCustom and it'll stop flashing

answered Feb 10 '16 at 09:29

arunjos007

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How can all those workaround "solutions" have so many upvotes when this simple answer must solve this issue 99% of the time... – Rob Apr 25 '19 at 07:19

score 10 · Answer 11 · answered May 22 '20 at 10:03

UIButton with system type has implicit animation on setTitle(_:for:). You can fix it two different ways:

Set the button type to custom, either from code or Interface Builder:

let button = UIButton(type: .custom)

Disable animation from code:

UIView.performWithoutAnimation {
    button.setTitle(title, for: .normal)
    button.layoutIfNeeded()
}

score 9 · Answer 12 · answered Dec 15 '17 at 09:07

9

Set UIButton type as Custom. That should remove fade in and out animations.

answered Dec 15 '17 at 09:07

Amit Tandel

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This should have more upvotes! Works perfectly and disables the animation at the root cause, instead of these other workarounds. – Jesper Schläger Feb 05 '19 at 12:53

score 8 · Answer 13 · answered Aug 09 '16 at 10:00

Usually simply setting the button type to Custom works for me, but for other reasons I needed to subclass UIButton and set the button type back to the default (System), so the blinking reappeared.

Setting UIView.setAnimationsEnabled(false) before changing the title and then to true again after that didn't avoid the blinking for me, no matter if I called self.layoutIfNeeded() or not.

This, and only this in the following exact order, worked for me with iOS 9 and 10 beta:

1) Create a subclass for UIButton (don't forget to set the custom class for the button in the Storyboard too).

2) Override setTitle:forState: as follows:

override func setTitle(title: String?, forState state: UIControlState) {

    UIView.performWithoutAnimation({

        super.setTitle(title, forState: state)

        self.layoutIfNeeded()
    })
}

In Interface Builder, you can leave the button type to System, no need to change it to Custom Type for this approach to work.

I hope this helps someone else, I've struggled for so long with the annoying blinking buttons that I hope to avoid it to others ;)

Don't forget `layoutIfNeeded()` :] – Tai Le Nov 16 '18 at 06:55 — Tai Le, Nov 16 '18 at 06:55
This should be the accepted answer. – Ilias Karim May 10 '21 at 22:01 — Ilias Karim, May 10 '21 at 22:01

score 6 · Answer 14 · answered Jun 16 '14 at 11:06

You can simply create Custom button and it will stop animate while changing the title.

        UIButton *btn = [UIButton buttonWithType:UIButtonTypeCustom];
        [btn setTitle:@"the title" forState:UIControlStateNormal];

you also can do it in Storyboard checkbox: select the button in storyboard -> select the attributes inspector (fourth from left side) -> in the 'Type' drop down menu, select 'Custom' instead of 'System' that was probably selected.

Good luck!

score 3 · Answer 15 · answered Apr 23 '14 at 17:47

3

You can remove the animations from from the title label's layer:

    [[[theButton titleLabel] layer] removeAllAnimations];

answered Apr 23 '14 at 17:47

Jacksonh

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I went through all the answers. This one is the best. – Rudolf Adamkovič Jul 04 '14 at 16:31
2

It still blinks but it's better. – Lucien Nov 25 '14 at 15:38
THIS SHOULD BE THE ANSWER. – mxcl Mar 30 '18 at 19:30

score 3 · Answer 16 · answered Oct 10 '18 at 17:32

Swift 4 version of Xhacker Liu answer

import Foundation
import UIKit
extension UIButton {
    func setTitleWithOutAnimation(title: String?) {
        UIView.setAnimationsEnabled(false)

        setTitle(title, for: .normal)

        layoutIfNeeded()
        UIView.setAnimationsEnabled(true)
    }
}

score 0 · Answer 17 · answered Feb 11 '14 at 12:59

0

I've found that this workaround works with UIButtonTypeSystem as well but will only work if the button is enabled for some reason.

[UIView setAnimationsEnabled:NO];
[_button setTitle:@"title" forState:UIControlStateNormal];
[UIView setAnimationsEnabled:YES];

So you'll have to add these if you need the button to be disabled when setting its title.

[UIView setAnimationsEnabled:NO];
_button.enabled = YES;
[_button setTitle:@"title" forState:UIControlStateNormal];
_button.enabled = NO;
[UIView setAnimationsEnabled:YES];

(iOS 7, Xcode 5)

answered Feb 11 '14 at 12:59

sCha

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Just confirmed that this workaround no longer works on iOS 7.1. – sCha Mar 13 '14 at 17:13
don't suppose you've found a solution for 7.1? – George Green Mar 20 '14 at 15:24
@GeorgeGreen couldn't find any working solutions for **UIButtonTypeSystem**. I had to use **UIButtonTypeCustom**. – sCha Mar 21 '14 at 05:31
Since 7.1, you'll need to apply title changes to all states, setting it just for the normal state no longer applies. `[_button setTitle:@"title" forState:UIControlStateDisabled]` – Sam Apr 02 '14 at 16:30

score 0 · Answer 18 · answered Feb 18 '14 at 14:36

Combining above great answers results in following workaround for UIButtonTypeSystem:

if (_button.enabled)
{
    [UIView setAnimationsEnabled:NO];
    [_button setTitle:@"title" forState:UIControlStateNormal];
    [UIView setAnimationsEnabled:YES];
}
else // disabled
{
    [UIView setAnimationsEnabled:NO];
    _button.enabled = YES;
    [_button setTitle:@"title" forState:UIControlStateNormal];
    _button.enabled = NO;
    [UIView setAnimationsEnabled:YES];
}

score 0 · Answer 19 · answered May 24 '14 at 21:35

I got the ugly animation problem when changing button titles in view controllers within a UITabBarController. The titles that were originally set in the storyboard showed up for a short while before fading into their new values.

I wanted to iterate through all subviews and use the button titles as keys to get their localized values with NSLocalizedString, such as;

for(UIView *v in view.subviews) {

    if ([v isKindOfClass:[UIButton class]]) {
        UIButton *btn = (UIButton*)v;
        NSString *newTitle = NSLocalizedString(btn.titleLabel.text, nil);
        [btn setTitle:newTitle];
    }

}

I found out that what's triggering the animation is really the call to btn.titleLabel.text. So to still make use of the storyboards and have the components dynamically localized like this I make sure to set every button's Restoration ID (in Identity Inspector) to the same as the title and use that as key instead of the title;

for(UIView *v in view.subviews) {

    if ([v isKindOfClass:[UIButton class]]) {
        UIButton *btn = (UIButton*)v;
        NSString *newTitle = NSLocalizedString(btn.restorationIdentifier, nil);
        [btn setTitle:newTitle];
    }

}

Not ideal, but works..

score 0 · Answer 20 · answered Jul 29 '15 at 19:19

You can actually set the title outside of an animation block, just be sure to call layoutIfNeeded() inside a performWithoutAnimation:

button1.setTitle("abc", forState: .Normal)
button2.setTitle("abc", forState: .Normal)
button3.setTitle("abc", forState: .Normal)
UIView.performWithoutAnimation {
    self.button1.layoutIfNeeded()
    self.button2.layoutIfNeeded()
    self.button3.layoutIfNeeded()
}

If you have a bunch of buttons, consider just calling layoutIfNeeded() on the super view:

button1.setTitle("abc", forState: .Normal)
button2.setTitle("abc", forState: .Normal)
button3.setTitle("abc", forState: .Normal)
UIView.performWithoutAnimation {
    self.view.layoutIfNeeded()
}

score 0 · Answer 21 · answered Nov 03 '16 at 12:42

The Xhacker Liu extension converted to Swift 3 :

extension UIButton {
    func setTitleWithoutAnimation(title: String?) {
        UIView.setAnimationsEnabled(false)

        setTitle(title, for: .normal)

        layoutIfNeeded()
        UIView.setAnimationsEnabled(true)
    }
}

score 0 · Answer 22 · answered Jul 31 '18 at 14:46

A convenient extension for animated button title change in Swift that plays nicely with the default implementation:

import UIKit

extension UIButton {
  /// By default iOS animated the title change, which is not desirable in reusable views
  func setTitle(_ title: String?, for controlState: UIControlState, animated: Bool = true) {
    if animated {
      setTitle(title, for: controlState)
    } else {
      UIView.setAnimationsEnabled(false)
      setTitle(title, for: controlState)
      layoutIfNeeded()
      UIView.setAnimationsEnabled(true)
    }
  }
}

@Fogmeister 1. My answer is different 2. Up-to-date Swift syntax 3. Consistent with Apple's API for `UIButton`. — Richard Topchii, Aug 22 '18 at 13:48

score -1 · Answer 23 · answered Mar 13 '14 at 20:29

Maybe generating 2 animations and 2 buttons is a better solution, to avoid the problem that is appearing with animating and changing the text of a button?

I created a second uibutton and generated 2 animation, this solution works with no hickups.

    _button2.hidden = TRUE;
    _button1.hidden = FALSE;

    CGPoint startLocation = CGPointMake(_button1.center.x, button1.center.y - 70);
    CGPoint stopLocation  = CGPointMake(_button2.center.x, button2.center.y- 70);


    [UIView animateWithDuration:0.3 animations:^{ _button2.center = stopLocation;} completion:^(BOOL finished){_button2.center = stopLocation;}];
    [UIView animateWithDuration:0.3 animations:^{ _button1.center = startLocation;} completion:^(BOOL finished){_button1.center = startLocation;}];

score -1 · Answer 24 · answered Feb 17 '15 at 12:16

-1

I got it to work with a combination of answers:

[[[button titleLabel] layer] removeAllAnimations];

    [UIView performWithoutAnimation:^{

        [button setTitle:@"Title" forState:UIControlStateNormal];

    }];

answered Feb 17 '15 at 12:16

Jasper

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How to stop unwanted UIButton animation on title change?

24 Answers24

Swift 5

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