Is it possible to customize UITabBarItem Badge?

Question

The question below is similar as mine.

How to use a custom UIImage as an UITabBarItem Badge?

Is it possible to use a background image instead of drawing it myself? I think it's fine since my app will only use a 1-digit badgeValue.

If it is not really possible, I want to know if we can change the badge color instead. The answers in the question below are not really helping.

Is it possible to change UITabBarItem badge color

Answer 1

This is your best bet. Add this extension at the file scope and you can customise the badges however you like. Just call self.tabBarController!.setBadges([1,0,2]) in any of your root view controllers.

To be clear that is for a tab bar with three items, with the badge values going from left to right.

If you want to add images instead just change the addBadge method

extension UITabBarController {
    
    func setBadges(badgeValues: [Int]) {

        var labelExistsForIndex = [Bool]()

        for _ in badgeValues {
            labelExistsForIndex.append(false)
        }

        for view in self.tabBar.subviews where view is PGTabBadge {
            let badgeView = view as! PGTabBadge
            let index = badgeView.tag
            
            if badgeValues[index] == 0 {
                badgeView.removeFromSuperview()
            }
            
            labelExistsForIndex[index] = true
            badgeView.text = String(badgeValues[index])
        }

        for i in 0...(labelExistsForIndex.count - 1) where !labelExistsForIndex[i] && (badgeValues[i] > 0) {
            addBadge(index: i, value: badgeValues[i], color: .red, font: UIFont(name: "Helvetica-Light", size: 11)!)
        }

    }

    func addBadge(index: Int, value: Int, color: UIColor, font: UIFont) {

        let itemPosition = CGFloat(index + 1)
        let itemWidth: CGFloat = tabBar.frame.width / CGFloat(tabBar.items!.count)

        let bgColor = color

        let xOffset: CGFloat = 5
        let yOffset: CGFloat = -12

        let badgeView = PGTabBadge()
        badgeView.frame.size =  CGSize(width: 12, height: 12)
        badgeView.center = CGPoint(x: (itemWidth * itemPosition) - (itemWidth / 2) + xOffset, y: 20 + yOffset)
        badgeView.layer.cornerRadius = badgeView.bounds.width/2
        badgeView.clipsToBounds = true
        badgeView.textColor = UIColor.white
        badgeView.textAlignment = .center
        badgeView.font = font
        badgeView.text = String(value)
        badgeView.backgroundColor = bgColor
        badgeView.tag = index
        tabBar.addSubview(badgeView)

    }
}
    
class PGTabBadge: UILabel { }