How can I add padding to the intrinsic content size of UILabel?

Question

I'm using autolayout on iOS7 and I have a problem like this:

I'm putting a UILabel onto a UIView and I'm arranging my autolayout constraints so that the label's centerX = parent view's centerX. I'm not giving any width constraint to the label. When I set the label's text on runtime, the label is drawn just wide enough for the text to fit, there are no margins/paddings on the left and right sides. What I want is to have some padding on the left and right sides, so that the text doesn't begin just where the label begins. The hack to achieve this could be setting the text as @" text " but of course that's not the way to go :)

How can I achieve what I want?

Answer 1

You can extend UILabel and override the intrinsicContentSize by yourself. Please make sure you have set the textAlignment = NSTextAlignmentCenter as well.

-(CGSize)intrinsicContentSize{
    CGSize contentSize = [super intrinsicContentSize];
    return CGSizeMake(contentSize.width + 50, contentSize.height);
}

Swift 5.0

open override var intrinsicContentSize: CGSize {
    let size = super.intrinsicContentSize
    return CGSize(width: size.width + 16, height: size.height)
}

This probably only works when you only have just one line of text to display.