Is it possible to opt-out of dark mode on iOS 13

Question

A large part of my app consists of web views to provide functionality not yet available through native implementations  The web team has no plans to implement a dark theme for the website  As such  my app will look a bit half half with Dark Mode support on iOS 13   Is it possible to opt out of Dark Mode support such that our app always shows light mode to match the website theme

User · Answer

import UIKit  extension UIViewController        override open func awakeFromNib              super awakeFromNib            if  available iOS 13 0                    overrideUserInterfaceStyle    light

User · Answer

If you are not using Xcode 11 or later  i e iOS 13 or later SDK   your app has not automatically opted to support dark mode  So  there s no need to opt out of dark mode   If you are using Xcode 11 or later  the system has automatically enabled dark mode for your app  There are two approaches to disable dark mode depending on your preference  You can disable it entirely or disable it for any specific window  view  or view controller    Disable Dark Mode Entirely for your App  You can disable dark mode by including the UIUserInterfaceStyle key with a value as Light in your app   s Info plist file   This ignores the user s preference and always applies a light appearance to your app   Disable dark mode for Window  View  or View Controller    You can force your interface to always appear in a light or dark style by setting the overrideUserInterfaceStyle property of the appropriate window  view  or view controller   View controllers   override func viewDidLoad         super viewDidLoad          view controller   s views and child view controllers       always adopt a light interface style         overrideUserInterfaceStyle    light     Views      The view and all of its subviews always adopt light style  youView overrideUserInterfaceStyle    light   Window      Everything in the window adopts the style    including the root view controller and all presentation controllers that   display content in that window    window overrideUserInterfaceStyle    light      Note  Apple strongly encourages to support dark mode in your app  So    you can only disable dark mode temporarily    Read more here  Choosing a Specific Interface Style for Your iOS App

User · Answer

Just simply add following key in your info plist file     lt key gt UIUserInterfaceStyle lt  key gt       lt string gt Light lt  string gt

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I would use this solution since window property may be changed during the app life cycle  So assigning  overrideUserInterfaceStyle    light  needs to be repeated  UIWindow appearance   enables us to set default value that will be used for newly created UIWindow objects   import UIKit   UIApplicationMain class AppDelegate  UIResponder  UIApplicationDelegate        var window  UIWindow       func application   application  UIApplication  didFinishLaunchingWithOptions launchOptions   UIApplication LaunchOptionsKey  Any    - gt  Bool          if  available iOS 13 0                 UIWindow appearance   overrideUserInterfaceStyle    light                return true

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Swift 5 Two ways to switch dark to light mode   1- info plist       lt key gt UIUserInterfaceStyle lt  key gt       lt string gt Light lt  string gt     2- Programmatically or Runtime     IBAction private func switchToDark   sender  UIButton           UIApplication shared windows forEach   window in               here you can switch between the dark and light             window overrideUserInterfaceStyle    dark

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iOS 14 3 and Xcode 12 3 Update In info plist file add Appearance as Light   lt key gt Appearance lt  key gt   lt string gt Light lt  string gt

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if  available iOS 13 0                   overrideUserInterfaceStyle    light           else                  Fallback on earlier versions

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Actually I just wrote some code that will allow you to globally opt out of dark mode in code without having to putz with every single viw controller in your application  This can probably be refined to opt out on a class by class basis by managing a list of classes  For me  what I want is for my users to see if they like the dark mode interface for my app  and if they don t like it  they can turn it off  This will allow them to continue using dark mode for the rest of their applications    User choice is good  Ahem  looking at you Apple  this is how you should have implemented it    So how this works is that it s just a category of UIViewController  When it loads it replaces the native viewDidLoad method with one that will check a global flag to see if dark mode is disabled for everything or not   Because it is triggered on UIViewController loading it should automatically start up and disable dark mode by default  If this is not what you want  then you need to get in there somewhere early and set the flag  or else just set the default flag   I haven t yet written anything to respond to the user turning the flag on or off  So this is basically example code  If we want the user to interact with this  all the view controllers will need to reload  I don t know how to do that offhand but probably sending some notification is going to do the trick  So right now  this global on off for dark mode is only going to work at startup or restart of the app    Now  it s not just enough to try to turn off dark mode in every single MFING viewController in your huge app  If you re using color assets you are completely boned  We for 10  years have understood immutable objects to be immutable  Colors you get from the color asset catalog say they are UIColor but they are dynamic  mutable  colors and will change underneath you as the system changes from dark to light mode  That is supposed to be a feature  But of course there is no master toggle to ask these things to stop making this change  as far as I know right now  maybe someone can improve this    So the solution is in two parts    a public category on UIViewController that gives some utility and convenience methods    for instance I don t think apple has thought about the fact that some of us mix in web code into our apps  As such we have stylesheets that need to be toggled based on dark or light mode  Thus  you either need to build some kind of a dynamic stylesheet object  which would be good  or just ask what the current state is  bad but easy   this category when it loads will replace the viewDidLoad method of the UIViewController class and intercept calls  I don t know if that breaks app store rules  If it does  there are other ways around that probably but you can consider it a proof of concept  You can for instance make one subclass of all the main view controller types and make all of your own view controllers inherit from those  and then you can use the DarkMode category idea and call into it to force opt out all of your view controllers  It is uglier but it is not going to break any rules  I prefer using the runtime because that s what the runtime was made to do  So in my version you just add the category  you set a global variable on the category for whether or not you want it to block dark mode  and it will do it  You are not out of the woods yet  as mentioned  the other problem is UIColor basically doing whatever the hell it wants  So even if your view controllers are blocking dark mode UIColor doesn t know where or how you re using it so can t adapt  As a result you can fetch it correctly but then it s going to revert on you at some point in the future  Maybe soon maybe later  So the way around that is by allocating it twice using a CGColor and turning it into a static color  This means if your user goes back and re-enables dark mode on your settings page  the idea here is to make this work so that the user has control over your app over and above the rest of the system   all of those static colors need replacing  So far this is left for someone else to solve  The easy ass way to do it is to make a default that you re opting out of dark mode  divide by zero to crash the app since you can t exit it and tell the user to just restart it  That probably violates app store guidelines as well but it s an idea    The UIColor category doesn t need to be exposed  it just works calling colorNamed      if you didn t tell the DarkMode ViewController class to block dark mode  it will work perfectly nicely as expected  Trying to make something elegant instead of the standard apple sphaghetti code which is going to mean you re going to have to modify most of your app if you want to programatically opt out of dark mode or toggle it  Now I don t know if there is a better way of programatically altering the Info plist to turn off dark mode as needed  As far as my understanding goes that s a compile time feature and after that you re boned   So here is the code you need  Should be drop in and just use the one method to set the UI Style or set the default in the code  You are free to use  modify  do whatever you want with this for any purpose and no warranty is given and I don t know if it will pass the app store  Improvements very welcome   Fair warning I don t use ARC or any other handholding methods          H file   import  lt UIKit UIKit h gt    interface UIViewController DarkMode      if you want to globally opt out of dark mode you call these before any view controllers load    at the moment they will only take effect for future loaded view controllers  rather than currently    loaded view controllers     we are doing it like this so you don t have to fill your code with  availables   when you include this typedef enum       QOverrideUserInterfaceStyleUnspecified      QOverrideUserInterfaceStyleLight      QOverrideUserInterfaceStyleDark    QOverrideUserInterfaceStyle      the opposite condition is light interface mode    void setOverrideUserInterfaceMode  QOverrideUserInterfaceStyle override     QOverrideUserInterfaceStyle overrideUserInterfaceMode      utility methods    this will tell you if any particular view controller is operating in dark mode -  BOOL isUsingDarkInterfaceStyle     this will tell you if any particular view controller is operating in light mode mode -  BOOL isUsingLightInterfaceStyle      this is called automatically during all view controller loads to enforce a single style -  void tryToOverrideUserInterfaceStyle    end          M file          QDarkMode m   import  UIViewController DarkMode h   import  q-runtime h     implementation UIViewController DarkMode   typedef void   void method imp t   id self  SEL cmd   static void method imp t  nativeViewDidLoad   NULL     we can t  available here because we re not in a method context static long  override   -1      void load     define DEFAULT UI STYLE UIUserInterfaceStyleLight        we won t mess around with anything that is not iOS 13 dark mode capable     if   available iOS 13                  default setting is to override into light style          override   DEFAULT UI STYLE                      This doesn t work            NSUserDefaults  d   NSUserDefaults standardUserDefaults           d setObject   Light  forKey   UIUserInterfaceStyle            id uiStyle    d objectForKey   UIUserInterfaceStyle            NSLog       uiStyle                       if    nativeViewDidLoad                Class targetClass   UIViewController class              SEL targetSelector    selector viewDidLoad               SEL replacementSelector    selector  overrideModeViewDidLoad                nativeViewDidLoad    void method imp t QMethodImplementationForSEL targetClass targetSelector               QInstanceMethodOverrideFromClass targetClass  targetSelector  targetClass  replacementSelector                         we do it like this because it s not going to be set often  and it will be tested often    so we can cache the value that we want to hand to the OS    void setOverrideUserInterfaceMode  QOverrideUserInterfaceStyle style        if   available iOS 13              switch style                case QOverrideUserInterfaceStyleLight                     override   UIUserInterfaceStyleLight                break              case QOverrideUserInterfaceStyleDark                     override   UIUserInterfaceStyleDark                break              default                     FALLTHROUGH - more modes can go here               case QOverrideUserInterfaceStyleUnspecified                     override   UIUserInterfaceStyleUnspecified                break                       QOverrideUserInterfaceStyle overrideUserInterfaceMode        if   available iOS 13              switch  override                case UIUserInterfaceStyleLight                    return QOverrideUserInterfaceStyleLight                break              case UIUserInterfaceStyleDark                    return QOverrideUserInterfaceStyleDark                break              default                     FALLTHROUGH                case UIUserInterfaceStyleUnspecified                    return QOverrideUserInterfaceStyleUnspecified                break                  else              we can t override anything below iOS 12         return QOverrideUserInterfaceStyleUnspecified           -  BOOL isUsingDarkInterfaceStyle        if   available iOS 13               if  self traitCollection userInterfaceStyle    UIUserInterfaceStyleDark               return YES                      return NO     -  BOOL isUsingLightInterfaceStyle        if   available iOS 13               if  self traitCollection userInterfaceStyle    UIUserInterfaceStyleLight               return YES                       if it s unspecified we should probably assume light mode  esp  iOS 12           return YES     -  void tryToOverrideUserInterfaceStyle           we have to check again or the compile will bitch     if   available iOS 13                self setOverrideUserInterfaceStyle  UIUserInterfaceStyle  override               this method will be called via the viewDidLoad chain as we will patch it into the    UIViewController class -  void  overrideModeViewDidLoad        if   nativeViewDidLoad             nativeViewDidLoad self  selector viewDidLoad               self tryToOverrideUserInterfaceStyle        end     keep this in the same file  hidden away as it needs to switch on the global     yeah global variables  I know  but viewDidLoad and colorNamed  are going to get called a ton and already it s adding some inefficiency to an already inefficient system     you can change if you want to make it a class variable       this is necessary because UIColor will also check the current trait collection when using asset catalogs    so we need to repair colorNamed  and possibly other methods  interface UIColor DarkMode   end   implementation UIColor  DarkMode   typedef UIColor    color method imp t   id self  SEL cmd  NSString  name   static color method imp t  nativeColorNamed   NULL     void load           we won t mess around with anything that is not iOS 13 dark mode capable     if   available iOS 13                  default setting is to override into light style         if    nativeColorNamed                   we need to call it once to force the color assets to load             Class targetClass   UIColor class              SEL targetSelector    selector colorNamed                SEL replacementSelector    selector  overrideColorNamed                 nativeColorNamed    color method imp t QClassMethodImplementationForSEL targetClass targetSelector               QClassMethodOverrideFromClass targetClass  targetSelector  targetClass  replacementSelector                          basically the colors you get    out of colorNamed  are dynamic colors    as the system traits change underneath you  the UIColor object you    have will also change since we can t force override the system traits all we can do is force the UIColor    that s requested to be allocated out of the trait collection  and then stripped of the dynamic info    unfortunately that means that all colors throughout the app will be static and that is either a bug or    a good thing since they won t respond to the system going in and out of dark mode    UIColor    overrideColorNamed  NSString   string        UIColor  value   nil      if   available iOS 13               value    nativeColorNamed self  selector colorNamed   string           if   override    UIUserInterfaceStyleUnspecified                   the value we have is a dynamic color    we need to resolve against a chosen trait collection             UITraitCollection  tc    UITraitCollection traitCollectionWithUserInterfaceStyle  override               value    value resolvedColorWithTraitCollection tc                   else              this is unreachable code since the method won t get patched in below iOS 13  so this            is left blank on purpose           return value     end   There is a set of utility functions that this uses for doing method swapping  Separate file  This is standard stuff though and you can find similar code anywhere      q-runtime h   import  lt Foundation Foundation h gt   import  lt objc message h gt   import  lt stdatomic h gt      returns the method implementation for the selector extern IMP QMethodImplementationForSEL Class aClass  SEL aSelector       as above but gets class method extern IMP QClassMethodImplementationForSEL Class aClass  SEL aSelector     extern BOOL QClassMethodOverrideFromClass Class targetClass  SEL targetSelector                                Class replacementClass  SEL replacementSelector    extern BOOL QInstanceMethodOverrideFromClass Class targetClass  SEL targetSelector                                   Class replacementClass  SEL replacementSelector        q-runtime m  static BOOL  QMethodOverride Class targetClass  SEL targetSelector  Method original  Method replacement        BOOL flag   NO      IMP imp   method getImplementation replacement          we need something to work with     if  replacement               if something was sitting on the SEL already         if  original                flag   method setImplementation original  imp    YES   NO                 if we re swapping  use this               method exchangeImplementations om  rm             else                  not sure this works with class methods                   if it s not there we want to add it             flag   YES              const char  types   method getTypeEncoding replacement               class addMethod targetClass targetSelector imp types               XLog FB red black   Not sure this works                           return flag     BOOL QInstanceMethodOverrideFromClass Class targetClass  SEL targetSelector                                   Class replacementClass  SEL replacementSelector        BOOL flag   NO      if  targetClass  amp  amp  replacementClass            Method om   class getInstanceMethod targetClass targetSelector           Method rm   class getInstanceMethod replacementClass replacementSelector           flag    QMethodOverride targetClass targetSelector om rm             return flag      BOOL QClassMethodOverrideFromClass Class targetClass  SEL targetSelector                                Class replacementClass  SEL replacementSelector        BOOL flag   NO      if  targetClass  amp  amp  replacementClass            Method om   class getClassMethod targetClass targetSelector           Method rm   class getClassMethod replacementClass replacementSelector           flag    QMethodOverride targetClass targetSelector om rm             return flag     IMP QMethodImplementationForSEL Class aClass  SEL aSelector        Method method   class getInstanceMethod aClass aSelector       if  method            return method getImplementation method         else           return NULL           IMP QClassMethodImplementationForSEL Class aClass  SEL aSelector        Method method   class getClassMethod aClass aSelector       if  method            return method getImplementation method         else           return NULL            I m copying and pasting this out of a couple of files since the q-runtime h is my reusable library and this is just a part of it  If something doesn t compile let me know

User · Answer

Just add these line in info plist file    lt key gt UIUserInterfaceStyle lt  key gt   lt string gt light lt  string gt    This will force app to run in light mode only

User · Answer

First  here is Apple s entry related to opting out of dark mode   The content at this link is written for Xcode 11  amp  iOS 13   This section applies to Xcode 11 usage       If you wish to opt out your ENTIRE application   Approach  1  Use the following key in your info plist file   UIUserInterfaceStyle   And assign it a value of Light   The XML for the UIUserInterfaceStyle assignment    lt key gt UIUserInterfaceStyle lt  key gt   lt string gt Light lt  string gt    Approach  2  You can set overrideUserInterfaceStyle against the app s window variable   Depending on how your project was created  this may be in the AppDelegate file or the SceneDelegate   if  available iOS 13 0           window  overrideUserInterfaceStyle    light          If you wish to opt out your UIViewController on an individual basis   override func viewDidLoad         super viewDidLoad          overrideUserInterfaceStyle is available with iOS 13     if  available iOS 13 0                  Always adopt a light interface style          overrideUserInterfaceStyle    light           Apple documentation for overrideUserInterfaceStyle  How the above code will look in Xcode 11     This section applies to Xcode 10 x usage    If you are using Xcode 11 for your submission  you can safely ignore everything below this line   Since the relevant API does not exist in iOS 12  you will get errors when attempting to use the values provided above   For setting overrideUserInterfaceStyle in your UIViewController        If you wish to opt out your UIViewController on an individual basis   This can be handled in Xcode 10 by testing the compiler version and the iOS version    if compiler  gt  5 1  if  available iOS 13 0              Always adopt a light interface style      overrideUserInterfaceStyle    light    endif      If you wish to opt out your ENTIRE application   You can modify the above snippet to work against the entire application for Xcode 10  by adding the following code to your AppDelegate file    if compiler  gt  5 1  if  available iOS 13 0              Always adopt a light interface style      window  overrideUserInterfaceStyle    light    endif   However  the plist setting will fail when using Xcode version 10 x     Credit to  Aron Nelson   Raimundas Sakalauskas    NSLeader and rmaddy for improving this answer with their feedback

User · Answer

Here are a few tips and tricks which you can use in your app to support or bypass the dark mode   First tip  To override the ViewController style  you can override the interface style of UIViewController by     1  overrideUserInterfaceStyle    dark   For dark mode       2  overrideUserInterfaceStyle    light   For light mode   class ViewController  UIViewController       override func viewDidLoad             super viewDidLoad           overrideUserInterfaceStyle    light               Second tip  Adding a key in info plist  Simply you can add a new key      UIUserInterfaceStyle   in your app info plist and set its value to Light or Dark  this will override the app default style to the value you provide  You don t have to add overrideUserInterfaceStyle    light this line in every viewController  just one line in info plist that   s it

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According to Apple s session on  Implementing Dark Mode on iOS   https   developer apple com videos play wwdc2019 214  starting at 31 13  it is possible to set overrideUserInterfaceStyle to UIUserInterfaceStyleLight or UIUserInterfaceStyleDark on any view controller or view  which will the be used in the traitCollection for any subview or view controller   As already mentioned by SeanR  you can set UIUserInterfaceStyle to Light or Dark in your app s plist file to change this for your whole app

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Yes you can skip by adding the following code in viewDidLoad   if  available iOS 13 0                  Always adopt a light interface style          overrideUserInterfaceStyle    light

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Xcode 12 and iOS 14 update  I have try the previous options to opt-out dark mode and this sentence in the info plist file is not working for me   lt key gt UIUserInterfaceStyle lt  key gt   lt string gt Light lt  string gt   Now it is renamed to   lt key gt Appearance lt  key gt   lt string gt Light lt  string gt   This setting will block all dark mode in the full app  EDITED  Fixed typo thank you to  sarah

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The answer above works if you want to opt out the whole app  If you are working on the lib that has UI  and you don t have luxury of editing  plist  you can do it via code too    If you are compiling against iOS 13 SDK  you can simply use following code   Swift   if  available iOS 13 0           self overrideUserInterfaceStyle    light     Obj-C   if   available iOS 13 0            self overrideUserInterfaceStyle   UIUserInterfaceStyleLight      HOWEVER  if you want your code to compile against iOS 12 SDK too  which right now is still the latest stable SDK   you should resort to using selectors  Code with selectors   Swift  XCode will show warnings for this code  but that s the only way to do it for now as property does not exist in SDK 12 therefore won t compile    if  available iOS 13 0           if self responds to  Selector  overrideUserInterfaceStyle              self setValue UIUserInterfaceStyle light rawValue  forKey   overrideUserInterfaceStyle             Obj-C   if   available iOS 13 0            if   self respondsToSelector NSSelectorFromString   overrideUserInterfaceStyle                self setValue   UIUserInterfaceStyleLight  forKey   overrideUserInterfaceStyle

User · Answer

Add this to info plist  lt key gt UIUserInterfaceStyle lt  key gt       lt string gt Light lt  string gt

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Latest Update-  If you re using Xcode 10 x  then the default UIUserInterfaceStyle is light for iOS 13 x  When run on an iOS 13 device  it will work in Light Mode only    No need to explicitly add the UIUserInterfaceStyle key in Info plist file  adding it will give an error when you Validate your app  saying      Invalid Info plist Key  The key  UIUserInterfaceStyle  in the Payload AppName appInfo plist file is not valid    Only add the UIUserInterfaceStyle key in Info plist file when using Xcode 11 x

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Easiest way for Xcode 11 and above              Add this to info plist before  lt  dict gt  lt  plist gt    lt key gt UIUserInterfaceStyle lt  key gt   lt string gt Light lt  string gt

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If you will add UIUserInterfaceStyle key to the plist file  possibly Apple will reject release build as mentioned here  https   stackoverflow com a 56546554 7524146  Anyway it s annoying to explicitly tell each ViewController self overrideUserInterfaceStyle    light  But you can use this peace of code once for your root window object   if  available iOS 13 0           if window responds to  Selector   overrideUserInterfaceStyle               window setValue UIUserInterfaceStyle light rawValue  forKey   overrideUserInterfaceStyle             Just notice you can t do this inside application application  didFinishLaunchingWithOptions   because for this selector will not respond true at that early stage  But you can do it later on  It s super easy if you are using custom AppPresenter or AppRouter class in your app instead of starting UI in the AppDelegate automatically

User · Answer

I think I ve found the solution  I initially pieced it together from UIUserInterfaceStyle - Information Property List and UIUserInterfaceStyle - UIKit  but have now found it actually documented at Choosing a specific interface style for your iOS app   In your info plist  set UIUserInterfaceStyle  User Interface Style  to 1  UIUserInterfaceStyle light    EDIT  As per dorbeetle s answer  a more appropriate setting for UIUserInterfaceStyle may be Light

User · Answer

In Xcode 12  you can change add as  quot appearances quot   This will work

User · Answer

- For entire App  Window    window  overrideUserInterfaceStyle    light   You can get the window from SceneDelegate  - For a single ViewController   viewController overrideUserInterfaceStyle    light   You can set any viewController  even inside the viewController itself  - For a single View   view overrideUserInterfaceStyle    light   You can set any view  even inside the view itself  You may need to use if  available iOS 13 0             if you are supporting earlier iOS versions

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Objective-c version   if   available iOS 13 0                 window overrideUserInterfaceStyle   UIUserInterfaceStyleLight

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My app does not support dark mode as of now and uses a light app bar color  I was able to force the status bar content to dark text and icons by adding the following key to my Info plist   lt key gt UIStatusBarStyle lt  key gt   lt string gt UIStatusBarStyleDarkContent lt  string gt   lt key gt UIUserInterfaceStyle lt  key gt   lt string gt Light lt  string gt   lt key gt UIViewControllerBasedStatusBarAppearance lt  key gt   lt true  gt   Find the other possible values here  https   developer apple com documentation uikit uistatusbarstyle Flutter Users Don t forget to set the app bar brightness attribute on your Flutter app bar like this  AppBar      backgroundColor  Colors grey 100       brightness  Brightness light      lt ---------     title  const Text  Hi there

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You can turn Dark Mode off in entire application in Xcode 11    Go Info plist Add bellow like    lt key gt UIUserInterfaceStyle lt  key gt   lt string gt Light lt  string gt     Info plist will be look like below

User · Answer

You can do  add this new key UIUserInterfaceStyle to Info plist and set its value to Light  and check alert controller appears with light mode   UIUserInterfaceStyle Light If you are force light dark mode in your whole application regardless of the user s settings by adding the key UIUserInterfaceStyle to your Info plist file and setting its value to either Light or Dark

User · Answer

Apart from other responses  from my understanding of the following  you only need to prepare for Dark mode when compiling against iOS 13 SDK  using XCode 11       The system assumes that apps linked against the iOS 13 or later SDK   support both light and dark appearances  In iOS  you specify the   specific appearance you want by assigning a specific interface style   to your window  view  or view controller  You can also disable support   for Dark Mode entirely using an Info plist key    Link

User · Answer

This question has so many answers  rather using it in info plist you can set it in AppDelegate like this    if compiler  gt  5 1          if  available iOS 13 0                   self window  overrideUserInterfaceStyle    light                    endif   Test on Xcode 11 3  iOS 13 3

[ios] Is it possible to opt-out of dark mode on iOS 13?

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