Hide UISearchBar clear text button

Question

I would like to know how to hide or not display the UISearchBar cross that appears in the textField fo the UISearchBar

I have tried using this

filterSearchBar.showsCancelButton = NO;

However this is an actual cancel button not the small grey cross, so I would like to know if there is an equivalent for the small grey button that shows in the UISearchBar.

score 36 · Accepted Answer · answered Feb 03 '14 at 08:38

36

You need to get the textField of the Search Bar:

UITextField *textField = [searchBar valueForKey:@"_searchField"];
textField.clearButtonMode = UITextFieldViewModeNever;

hope this help! =)

answered Feb 03 '14 at 08:38

Soto_iGhost

661
1
9
12

Where do you find the key "_searchField" is it somewhere in documentation? – Sébastien REMY Sep 05 '16 at 07:52
1

You can find it in the run time headers. I.e. https://github.com/nst/iOS-Runtime-Headers. – Saren Inden Feb 27 '17 at 15:10

score 9 · Answer 2 · answered Apr 14 '15 at 21:20

9

There's a better way to do this, and you don't have to use private APIs or traverse subviews to do it, so this solution is App Store safe.

UISearchBar has a built-in API for doing this:

[UISearchBar setImage:forSearchBarIcon:state]

The SearchBar icon key you want is UISearchBarIconClear, and you want the UIControlStateNormal state. Then give it a clear image for the image, and you're done.

So, it should look like this:

[searchBar setImage:clearImage forSearchBarIcon:UISearchBarIconClear state:UIControlStateNormal];

answered Apr 14 '15 at 21:20

Alexander

555
9
19

3

While this technically makes the button invisible, you can still tap it. But +1 for using official APIs. – zliw Feb 29 '16 at 12:50
anyone found a non-hack solution to prevent interaction to the button? – Charlton Provatas Oct 09 '17 at 18:58

score 7 · Answer 3 · edited Jul 03 '18 at 09:52

7

Based on @Gines answer, here is the Swift version:

func searchBarTextDidBeginEditing(searchBar: UISearchBar) {
    guard let firstSubview = searchBar.subviews.first else { return }

    firstSubview.subviews.forEach {
        ($0 as? UITextField)?.clearButtonMode = .never
    }
}

edited Jul 03 '18 at 09:52

sunkehappy

8,724
5
41
63

answered Jul 25 '16 at 09:53

kishorer747

800
1
7
23

@Tom thanks for the edit. Looks perfect. Is this a correct approach? – kishorer747 Aug 09 '16 at 10:00
1

I actually think Soto_iGhost's approach is best to solve this particular problem. But when I saw your code I couldn't help myself to edit it ☺️ There are of course many approaches to write this same piece of logic, but I like this one the best. – Tom van Zummeren Aug 10 '16 at 08:27

Charlton Provatas · Answer 4 · 2017-10-09T19:15:08.907

7

Swift 4

Adding to Alexander's answer and block user interaction on clear button:

To hide button:

searchBar.setImage(UIImage(), for: .clear, state: .normal)

To disable user interaction on the clear button, simply subclass UISearchBar

class CustomSearchBar: UISearchBar {

    override func hitTest(_ point: CGPoint, with event: UIEvent?) -> UIView? {
        let view = super.hitTest(point, with: event)
        if view is UIButton {
            return view?.superview // this will pass-through all touches that would've been sent to the button
        }
        return view
    }
}

edited Oct 09 '17 at 19:15

answered Oct 09 '17 at 19:09

Charlton Provatas

2,068
23
18

This is a good solution for swift 4+, I have been using above methods which takes "_searchField" as key. but application is crashing at iOS 13.2.2. This solution has fixed my problem both for lower iOS versions and latest one. – Muhammad Adil Dec 01 '19 at 09:46

Luis Antonio Canettoli Ordoñez · Answer 5 · 2020-01-09T17:38:10.663

5

Swift 5

Tested on iOS 13

One liner working for me:

searchBar.searchTextField.clearButtonMode = .never

You can also set it to .whileEditing to have it displayed when the user is typing and then removed when the search bar loses focus.

edited Jan 09 '20 at 17:38

answered Jan 09 '20 at 11:21

Luis Antonio Canettoli Ordoñez

491
6
9

score 4 · Answer 6 · answered Dec 05 '17 at 14:34

4

You can remove the clear text button for all UISearchBar instances:

[UITextField appearanceWhenContainedInInstancesOfClasses:@[[UISearchBar class]]].clearButtonMode = UITextFieldViewModeNever;

answered Dec 05 '17 at 14:34

thijsonline

959
8
15

THIS is the only valid non-hackish answer. Good job! – Jan Jan 16 '18 at 22:07
This answer looks good - can we still set it for a search bar of a particular view-controller class? I've searchbar at multiple places and need to update this for only one class. – Hemang Aug 21 '19 at 09:05

score 3 · Answer 7 · answered Apr 28 '17 at 02:09

3

Swift 3, based on @Alexsander answer:

searchBar.setImage(UIImage(), for: .clear, state: .normal)

answered Apr 28 '17 at 02:09

oskarsprima

89
2

score 3 · Answer 8 · answered Apr 30 '20 at 10:13

3

Swift 5

Just add a single line below

searchBar.searchTextField.clearButtonMode = .never

answered Apr 30 '20 at 10:13

Anurag Bhakuni

2,281
23
32

score 2 · Answer 9 · answered Jan 23 '18 at 08:49

2

Swift 3 solution :

extension UISearchBar{
    var textField : UITextField{
        return self.value(forKey: "_searchField") as! UITextField
    }
}

Usage :

searchBar.textField.clearButtonMode = .never

answered Jan 23 '18 at 08:49

Maor

3,040
3
27
37

1

this is crashing – Denis Kakačka Oct 24 '18 at 06:10

score 1 · Answer 10 · answered Oct 22 '15 at 09:44

I tried different solutions about this issue, even the one selected in this post, but they didn't work.

This is the way I found to solve this issue:

UIView *subview = [[searchBar subviews] firstObject]; //SearchBar only have one subview (UIView)

//There are three sub subviews (UISearchBarBackground, UINavigationButton, UISearchBarTextField)
for (UIView *subsubview in subview.subviews)
{
    //The UISearchBarTextField class is a UITextField. We can't use UISearchBarTextField directly here.
    if ([subsubview isKindOfClass: [UITextField class]])
    {
            [(UITextField *)subsubview setClearButtonMode:UITextFieldViewModeNever];
    }
}

thanks, it worked!, the key was to search through subviews of first subview of Searchbar. See my answer for swift version — kishorer747, Jul 25 '16 at 09:47

score 1 · Answer 11 · answered May 05 '17 at 08:01

1

Try this:

- (void)searchBar:(UISearchBar *)searchBar textDidChange:(NSString *)searchText {
    UITextField *textField = [searchBar valueForKey:@"_searchField"];
    textField.clearButtonMode = UITextFieldViewModeNever;

}

answered May 05 '17 at 08:01

Vahe Andreasyan

11
1

some explanation please? – ngstschr May 05 '17 at 08:23

score 0 · Answer 12 · answered Sep 21 '16 at 07:55

In Case of Swift 2.3 just use :

var searchBar = UISearchBar();
searchBar.frame = CGRectMake(0, 0, 00, 20))
for subview: UIView in (searchBar.subviews.first?.subviews)!
        {
            if (subview.isKindOfClass(UITextField) )
            {
                let textFieldObject = (subview as! UITextField)
                textFieldObject.clearButtonMode = .Never;
            }
        }

score 0 · Answer 13 · answered Oct 11 '16 at 11:12

Swift 2.3, based on @Alexsander answer:

searchBar.setImage(UIImage(named: "SearchClearIcon"), forSearchBarIcon: UISearchBarIcon.Clear, state: UIControlState.Highlighted)
searchBar.setImage(UIImage(named: "SearchClearIcon"), forSearchBarIcon: UISearchBarIcon.Clear, state: UIControlState.Normal)

score 0 · Answer 14 · answered Jul 27 '18 at 10:14

Converting Soto_iGhost's answer to Swift 4:

func searchBarTextDidBeginEditing(_ searchBar: UISearchBar) {

    let textField: UITextField = searchBar.value(forKey: "_searchField") as! UITextField
    textField.clearButtonMode = .never
}

If you have an outlet of UISearchBar the you can write above code anywhere in your class.

score 0 · Answer 15 · answered Aug 21 '19 at 09:22

0

thijsonline's answer in swift:

(UITextField.appearance(whenContainedInInstancesOf: [UISearchBar.self])).clearButtonMode = .never

answered Aug 21 '19 at 09:22

Hemang

26,372
18
120
180

Hide UISearchBar clear text button

15 Answers15

Swift 5

Linked