[iphone] How do I make UITableViewCell's ImageView a fixed size even when the image is smaller

I have a bunch of images I am using for cell's image views, they are all no bigger than 50x50. e.g. 40x50, 50x32, 20x37 .....

When I load the table view, the text doesn't line up because the width of the images varies. Also I would like small images to appear in the centre as opposed to on the left.

Here is the code I am trying inside my 'cellForRowAtIndexPath' method

cell.imageView.autoresizingMask = ( UIViewAutoresizingNone );
cell.imageView.autoresizesSubviews = NO;
cell.imageView.contentMode = UIViewContentModeCenter;
cell.imageView.bounds = CGRectMake(0, 0, 50, 50);
cell.imageView.frame = CGRectMake(0, 0, 50, 50);
cell.imageView.image = [UIImage imageWithData: imageData];

As you can see I have tried a few things, but none of them work.

I had the same problem. Thank you to everyone else who answered - I was able to get a solution together using parts of several of these answers.

My solution is using swift 5

The problem that we are trying to solve is that we may have images with different aspect ratios in our TableViewCells but we want them to render with consistent widths. The images should, of course, render with no distortion and fill the entire space. In my case, I was fine with some "cropping" of tall, skinny images, so I used the content mode .scaleAspectFill

To do this, I created a custom subclass of UITableViewCell. In my case, I named it StoryTableViewCell. The entire class is pasted below, with comments inline.

This approach worked for me when also using a custom Accessory View and long text labels. Here's an image of the final result:

Rendered Table View with consistent image width

class StoryTableViewCell: UITableViewCell {

    override func layoutSubviews() {
        super.layoutSubviews()

        // ==== Step 1 ====
        // ensure we have an image
        guard let imageView = self.imageView else {return}

        // create a variable for the desired image width
        let desiredWidth:CGFloat = 70;

        // get the width of the image currently rendered in the cell
        let currentImageWidth = imageView.frame.size.width;

        // grab the width of the entire cell's contents, to be used later
        let contentWidth = self.contentView.bounds.width

        // ==== Step 2 ====
        // only update the image's width if the current image width isn't what we want it to be
        if (currentImageWidth != desiredWidth) {
            //calculate the difference in width
            let widthDifference = currentImageWidth - desiredWidth;

            // ==== Step 3 ====
            // Update the image's frame,
            // maintaining it's original x and y values, but with a new width
            self.imageView?.frame = CGRect(imageView.frame.origin.x,
                                           imageView.frame.origin.y,
                                           desiredWidth,
                                           imageView.frame.size.height);

            // ==== Step 4 ====
            // If there is a texst label, we want to move it's x position to
            // ensure it isn't overlapping with the image, and that it has proper spacing with the image
            if let textLabel = self.textLabel
            {
                let originalFrame = self.textLabel?.frame

                // the new X position for the label is just the original position,
                // minus the difference in the image's width
                let newX = textLabel.frame.origin.x - widthDifference
                self.textLabel?.frame = CGRect(newX,
                                               textLabel.frame.origin.y,
                                               contentWidth - newX,
                                               textLabel.frame.size.height);
                print("textLabel info: Original =\(originalFrame!)", "updated=\(self.textLabel!.frame)")
            }

            // ==== Step 4 ====
            // If there is a detail text label, do the same as step 3
            if let detailTextLabel = self.detailTextLabel {
                let originalFrame = self.detailTextLabel?.frame
                let newX = detailTextLabel.frame.origin.x-widthDifference
                self.detailTextLabel?.frame = CGRect(x: newX,
                                                     y: detailTextLabel.frame.origin.y,
                                                     width: contentWidth - newX,
                                                     height: detailTextLabel.frame.size.height);
                print("detailLabel info: Original =\(originalFrame!)", "updated=\(self.detailTextLabel!.frame)")
            }

            // ==== Step 5 ====
            // Set the image's content modoe to scaleAspectFill so it takes up the entire view, but doesn't get distorted
            self.imageView?.contentMode = .scaleAspectFill;
        }
    }
}

The solution we ended up with is similar to many of the others. But to get the correct position of the separator we had to set it before calling super.layoutSubviews(). Simplified example:

class ImageTableViewCell: UITableViewCell {

    override func layoutSubviews() {
        separatorInset.left = 70
        super.layoutSubviews()

        imageView?.frame = CGRect(x: 0, y: 0, width: 50, height: 50)
        textLabel?.frame = CGRect(x: 70, y: 0, width: 200, height: 50)
    }

}

If you use cell.imageView?.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false you can set constraints on the imageView. Here's a working example I used in a project. I avoided subclassing and didn't need to create storyboard with prototype cells but did take me quite a while to get running, so probably best to only use if there isn't a simpler or more concise way available to you.

override func tableView(_ tableView: UITableView, heightForRowAt indexPath: IndexPath) -> CGFloat {
    return 80
}



    override func tableView(_ tableView: UITableView, cellForRowAt indexPath: IndexPath) -> UITableViewCell {
    let cell = UITableViewCell(style: .subtitle, reuseIdentifier: String(describing: ChangesRequiringApprovalTableViewController.self))

    let record = records[indexPath.row]

    cell.textLabel?.text = "Title text"

    if let thumb = record["thumbnail"] as? CKAsset, let image = UIImage(contentsOfFile: thumb.fileURL.path) {
        cell.imageView?.contentMode = .scaleAspectFill
        cell.imageView?.image = image
        cell.imageView?.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false
        cell.imageView?.leadingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: cell.contentView.leadingAnchor).isActive = true
        cell.imageView?.widthAnchor.constraint(equalToConstant: 80).rowHeight).isActive = true
        cell.imageView?.heightAnchor.constraint(equalToConstant: 80).isActive = true
        if let textLabel = cell.textLabel {
            let margins = cell.contentView.layoutMarginsGuide
            textLabel.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false
            cell.imageView?.trailingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: textLabel.leadingAnchor, constant: -8).isActive = true
            textLabel.topAnchor.constraint(equalTo: margins.topAnchor).isActive = true
            textLabel.trailingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: margins.trailingAnchor).isActive = true
            let bottomConstraint = textLabel.bottomAnchor.constraint(equalTo: margins.bottomAnchor)
            bottomConstraint.priority = UILayoutPriorityDefaultHigh
            bottomConstraint.isActive = true
            if let description = cell.detailTextLabel {
                description.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false
                description.bottomAnchor.constraint(equalTo: margins.bottomAnchor).isActive = true
                description.trailingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: margins.trailingAnchor).isActive = true
                cell.imageView?.trailingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: description.leadingAnchor, constant: -8).isActive = true
                textLabel.bottomAnchor.constraint(equalTo: description.topAnchor).isActive = true
            }
        }
        cell.imageView?.clipsToBounds = true
    }

    cell.detailTextLabel?.text = "Detail Text"

    return cell
}

The regular UITableViewCell works well to position things but the cell.imageView doesn't seem to behave like you want it to. I found that it's simple enough to get the UITableViewCell to lay out properly by first giving the cell.imageView a properly sized image like

// Putting in a blank image to make sure text always pushed to the side.
UIGraphicsBeginImageContextWithOptions(CGSizeMake(kGroupImageDimension, kGroupImageDimension), NO, 0.0);
UIImage *blank = UIGraphicsGetImageFromCurrentImageContext();
UIGraphicsEndImageContext();
cell.imageView.image = blank;

Then you can just connect up your own properly working UIImageView with

// The cell.imageView increases in size to accomodate the image given it.
// We don't want this behaviour so we just attached a view on top of cell.imageView.
// This gives us the positioning of the cell.imageView without the sizing
// behaviour.
UIImageView *anImageView = nil;
NSArray *subviews = [cell.imageView subviews];
if ([subviews count] == 0)
{
    anImageView = [[UIImageView alloc] init];
    anImageView.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = NO;
    [cell.imageView addSubview:anImageView];

    NSLayoutConstraint *aConstraint = [NSLayoutConstraint constraintWithItem:anImageView attribute:NSLayoutAttributeCenterX relatedBy:NSLayoutRelationEqual toItem:cell.imageView attribute:NSLayoutAttributeCenterX multiplier:1.0 constant:0.0];
    [cell.imageView addConstraint:aConstraint];

    aConstraint = [NSLayoutConstraint constraintWithItem:anImageView attribute:NSLayoutAttributeCenterY relatedBy:NSLayoutRelationEqual toItem:cell.imageView attribute:NSLayoutAttributeCenterY multiplier:1.0 constant:0.0];
    [cell.imageView addConstraint:aConstraint];

    aConstraint = [NSLayoutConstraint constraintWithItem:anImageView attribute:NSLayoutAttributeWidth relatedBy:NSLayoutRelationEqual toItem:nil attribute:NSLayoutAttributeNotAnAttribute multiplier:0.0 constant:kGroupImageDimension];
    [cell.imageView addConstraint:aConstraint];

    aConstraint = [NSLayoutConstraint constraintWithItem:anImageView attribute:NSLayoutAttributeHeight relatedBy:NSLayoutRelationEqual toItem:nil attribute:NSLayoutAttributeNotAnAttribute multiplier:0.0 constant:kGroupImageDimension];
    [cell.imageView addConstraint:aConstraint];
}
else
{
    anImageView = [subviews firstObject];
}

Set the image on anImageView and it will do what you expect a UIImageView to do. Be the size you want it regardless of the image you give it. This should go in tableView:cellForRowAtIndexPath:

Here is @germanattanasio 's working method, written for Swift 3

func tableView(_ tableView: UITableView, cellForRowAt indexPath: IndexPath) -> UITableViewCell {
    ...
    cell.imageView?.image = myImage
    let itemSize = CGSize(width:42.0, height:42.0)
    UIGraphicsBeginImageContextWithOptions(itemSize, false, 0.0)
    let imageRect = CGRect(x:0.0, y:0.0, width:itemSize.width, height:itemSize.height)
    cell.imageView?.image!.draw(in:imageRect)
    cell.imageView?.image! = UIGraphicsGetImageFromCurrentImageContext()!
        UIGraphicsEndImageContext()
}

This worked for me in swift:

Create a subclass of UITableViewCell (make sure you link up your cell in the storyboard)

class MyTableCell:UITableViewCell{
    override func layoutSubviews() {
        super.layoutSubviews()

        if(self.imageView?.image != nil){

            let cellFrame = self.frame
            let textLabelFrame = self.textLabel?.frame
            let detailTextLabelFrame = self.detailTextLabel?.frame
            let imageViewFrame = self.imageView?.frame

            self.imageView?.contentMode = .ScaleAspectFill
            self.imageView?.clipsToBounds = true
            self.imageView?.frame = CGRectMake((imageViewFrame?.origin.x)!,(imageViewFrame?.origin.y)! + 1,40,40)
            self.textLabel!.frame = CGRectMake(50 + (imageViewFrame?.origin.x)! , (textLabelFrame?.origin.y)!, cellFrame.width-(70 + (imageViewFrame?.origin.x)!), textLabelFrame!.height)
            self.detailTextLabel!.frame = CGRectMake(50 + (imageViewFrame?.origin.x)!, (detailTextLabelFrame?.origin.y)!, cellFrame.width-(70 + (imageViewFrame?.origin.x)!), detailTextLabelFrame!.height)
        }
    }
}

In cellForRowAtIndexPath , dequeue the cell as your new cell type:

    let cell = tableView.dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier("MyCell", forIndexPath: indexPath) as! MyTableCell

Obviously change number values to suit your layout

UIImage *image = cell.imageView.image;

UIGraphicsBeginImageContext(CGSizeMake(35,35));
// draw scaled image into thumbnail context

[image drawInRect:CGRectMake(5, 5, 35, 35)]; //
UIImage *newThumbnail = UIGraphicsGetImageFromCurrentImageContext();
// pop the context
UIGraphicsEndImageContext();
if(newThumbnail == nil)
{
    NSLog(@"could not scale image");
    cell.imageView.image = image;
}
else
{
    cell.imageView.image = newThumbnail;
}

This solution essentially draws the image as 'aspect fit' within the given rect.

CGSize itemSize = CGSizeMake(80, 80);
UIGraphicsBeginImageContextWithOptions(itemSize, NO, UIScreen.mainScreen.scale);
UIImage *image = cell.imageView.image;

CGRect imageRect;
if(image.size.height > image.size.width) {
    CGFloat width = itemSize.height * image.size.width / image.size.height;
    imageRect = CGRectMake((itemSize.width - width) / 2, 0, width, itemSize.height);
} else {
    CGFloat height = itemSize.width * image.size.height / image.size.width;
    imageRect = CGRectMake(0, (itemSize.height - height) / 2, itemSize.width, height);
}

[cell.imageView.image drawInRect:imageRect];
cell.imageView.image = UIGraphicsGetImageFromCurrentImageContext();
UIGraphicsEndImageContext();

image view add as a sub view to the tableview cell

UIImageView *imgView=[[UIImageView alloc] initWithFrame:CGRectMake(20, 5, 90, 70)];
imgView.backgroundColor=[UIColor clearColor];
[imgView.layer setCornerRadius:8.0f];
[imgView.layer setMasksToBounds:YES];
[imgView setImage:[UIImage imageWithData: imageData]];
[cell.contentView addSubview:imgView];

Here's how i did it. This technique takes care of moving the text and detail text labels appropriately to the left:

@interface SizableImageCell : UITableViewCell {}
@end
@implementation SizableImageCell
- (void)layoutSubviews {
    [super layoutSubviews];

    float desiredWidth = 80;
    float w=self.imageView.frame.size.width;
    if (w>desiredWidth) {
        float widthSub = w - desiredWidth;
        self.imageView.frame = CGRectMake(self.imageView.frame.origin.x,self.imageView.frame.origin.y,desiredWidth,self.imageView.frame.size.height);
        self.textLabel.frame = CGRectMake(self.textLabel.frame.origin.x-widthSub,self.textLabel.frame.origin.y,self.textLabel.frame.size.width+widthSub,self.textLabel.frame.size.height);
        self.detailTextLabel.frame = CGRectMake(self.detailTextLabel.frame.origin.x-widthSub,self.detailTextLabel.frame.origin.y,self.detailTextLabel.frame.size.width+widthSub,self.detailTextLabel.frame.size.height);
        self.imageView.contentMode = UIViewContentModeScaleAspectFit;
    }
}
@end

...

- (UITableViewCell *)tableView:(UITableView *)tableView cellForRowAtIndexPath:(NSIndexPath *)indexPath {
    static NSString *CellIdentifier = @"Cell";

    UITableViewCell *cell = [tableView dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier:CellIdentifier];
    if (cell == nil) {
        cell = [[[SizableImageCell alloc] initWithStyle:UITableViewCellStyleSubtitle reuseIdentifier:CellIdentifier] autorelease];
        cell.accessoryType = UITableViewCellAccessoryDisclosureIndicator;
    }

    cell.textLabel.text = ...
    cell.detailTextLabel.text = ...
    cell.imageView.image = ...
    return cell;
}

The whole cell doesn't need to be remade. You could use the indentationLevel and indentationWidth property of tableViewCells to shift the content of your cell. Then you add your custom imageView to the left side of the cell.

Better create an image view and add it as a sub view to the cell.Then you can get the desired frame size.

I've created an extension using @GermanAttanasio 's answer. It provides a method to resize an image to a desired size, and another method to do the same while adding a transparent margin to the image (this can be useful for table views where you want the image to have a margin as well).

import UIKit

extension UIImage {

    /// Resizes an image to the specified size.
    ///
    /// - Parameters:
    ///     - size: the size we desire to resize the image to.
    ///
    /// - Returns: the resized image.
    ///
    func imageWithSize(size: CGSize) -> UIImage {

        UIGraphicsBeginImageContextWithOptions(size, false, UIScreen.mainScreen().scale);
        let rect = CGRectMake(0.0, 0.0, size.width, size.height);
        drawInRect(rect)

        let resultingImage = UIGraphicsGetImageFromCurrentImageContext();
        UIGraphicsEndImageContext();

        return resultingImage
    }

    /// Resizes an image to the specified size and adds an extra transparent margin at all sides of
    /// the image.
    ///
    /// - Parameters:
    ///     - size: the size we desire to resize the image to.
    ///     - extraMargin: the extra transparent margin to add to all sides of the image.
    ///
    /// - Returns: the resized image.  The extra margin is added to the input image size.  So that
    ///         the final image's size will be equal to:
    ///         `CGSize(width: size.width + extraMargin * 2, height: size.height + extraMargin * 2)`
    ///
    func imageWithSize(size: CGSize, extraMargin: CGFloat) -> UIImage {

        let imageSize = CGSize(width: size.width + extraMargin * 2, height: size.height + extraMargin * 2)

        UIGraphicsBeginImageContextWithOptions(imageSize, false, UIScreen.mainScreen().scale);
        let drawingRect = CGRect(x: extraMargin, y: extraMargin, width: size.width, height: size.height)
        drawInRect(drawingRect)

        let resultingImage = UIGraphicsGetImageFromCurrentImageContext();
        UIGraphicsEndImageContext();

        return resultingImage
    }
}

A Simply Swift,

Step 1: Create One SubClass of UITableViewCell
Step 2: Add this method to SubClass of UITableViewCell

override func layoutSubviews() {
    super.layoutSubviews()
    self.imageView?.frame = CGRectMake(0, 0, 10, 10)
}

Step 3: Create cell object using that SubClass in cellForRowAtIndexPath,

Ex: let customCell:CustomCell = CustomCell(style: UITableViewCellStyle.Default, reuseIdentifier: "Cell")

Step 4: Enjoy

For those of you who don't have a subclass of UITableViewCell:

- (UITableViewCell *)tableView:(UITableView *)tableView cellForRowAtIndexPath:(NSIndexPath *)indexPath {
 [...]

      CGSize itemSize = CGSizeMake(40, 40);
      UIGraphicsBeginImageContextWithOptions(itemSize, NO, UIScreen.mainScreen.scale);
      CGRect imageRect = CGRectMake(0.0, 0.0, itemSize.width, itemSize.height);
      [cell.imageView.image drawInRect:imageRect];
      cell.imageView.image = UIGraphicsGetImageFromCurrentImageContext();
      UIGraphicsEndImageContext();

 [...]
     return cell;
}

The code above sets the size to be 40x40.

Swift 2

    let itemSize = CGSizeMake(25, 25);
    UIGraphicsBeginImageContextWithOptions(itemSize, false, UIScreen.mainScreen().scale);
    let imageRect = CGRectMake(0.0, 0.0, itemSize.width, itemSize.height);
    cell.imageView?.image!.drawInRect(imageRect)
    cell.imageView?.image! = UIGraphicsGetImageFromCurrentImageContext();
    UIGraphicsEndImageContext();

Or you can use another(not tested) approach suggested by @Tommy:

- (UITableViewCell *)tableView:(UITableView *)tableView cellForRowAtIndexPath:(NSIndexPath *)indexPath {
 [...]

      CGSize itemSize = CGSizeMake(40, 40);
      UIGraphicsBeginImageContextWithOptions(itemSize, NO, 0.0)          
 [...]
     return cell;
}

Swift 3+

let itemSize = CGSize.init(width: 25, height: 25)
UIGraphicsBeginImageContextWithOptions(itemSize, false, UIScreen.main.scale);
let imageRect = CGRect.init(origin: CGPoint.zero, size: itemSize)
cell?.imageView?.image!.draw(in: imageRect)
cell?.imageView?.image! = UIGraphicsGetImageFromCurrentImageContext()!;
UIGraphicsEndImageContext();

The code above is the Swift 3+ version of the above.