Change Font of Back Navigation Bar Button

Change the font on the back button of a navigation controller under swift 4

For Swift 4, U can try this in AppDelegate.

func application(_ application: UIApplication, didFinishLaunchingWithOptions launchOptions: [UIApplicationLaunchOptionsKey: Any]?) -> Bool {

        UIBarButtonItem.appearance().setTitleTextAttributes([NSAttributedStringKey.foregroundColor: UIColor.red, NSAttributedStringKey.font: UIFont(name: "AvenirNextCondensed-DemiBoldItalic", size: 15)!], for: UIControlState.normal)

        UIBarButtonItem.appearance().setTitleTextAttributes([NSAttributedStringKey.foregroundColor: UIColor.green, NSAttributedStringKey.font : UIFont(name: "AvenirNextCondensed-DemiBoldItalic", size: 20)! ], for: .highlighted)
        UIBarButtonItem.appearance().setTitleTextAttributes([NSAttributedStringKey.foregroundColor: UIColor.blue, NSAttributedStringKey.font : UIFont(name: "AvenirNextCondensed-DemiBoldItalic", size: 20)! ], for: .focused)

        return true
}

In ViewController.

override func viewWillAppear(_ animated: Bool) {

    self.title = "List"
    self.navigationController?.navigationBar.titleTextAttributes = [ NSAttributedStringKey.font: UIFont(name: "AvenirNextCondensed-DemiBoldItalic", size: 20)!]

    // THE BELOW THREE LINES NOT WORKING.

    //navigationItem.backBarButtonItem?.setTitleTextAttributes([NSAttributedStringKey.font: UIFont(name: "AvenirNextCondensed-DemiBoldItalic", size: 20)!], for: .normal)

    //navigationItem.backBarButtonItem?.setTitleTextAttributes([NSAttributedStringKey.font: UIFont(name: "AvenirNextCondensed-DemiBoldItalic", size: 20)!], for: .highlighted)

    //navigationItem.backBarButtonItem?.setTitleTextAttributes([NSAttributedStringKey.font: UIFont(name: "AvenirNextCondensed-DemiBoldItalic", size: 20)!], for: .focused)

}

Storyboard

Output

How can I change the font of the back button for my navigation bar?

Just tested your code and it seems the reason that line is returning nil is actually because name: "FONTNAME" returns nil. So if you set that name attribute to a valid font name, the code should run without an error -- even if navigationController?.navigationItem.leftBarButtonItem is explicitly set to nil.

But regardless, also as I've seen through testing, this line won't give you the result you apparently want. The leading navigationController optional shouldn't be there since it accesses your UINavigationController and not the current view. Simply use the UIViewController's own navigationItem property to access its leftBarButtonItem directly, ex:

let backButton = UIBarButtonItem(title: "< Back", style: UIBarButtonItemStyle.Plain, target: self, action: "goBack")
navigationItem.leftBarButtonItem = backButton
navigationItem.leftBarButtonItem?.setTitleTextAttributes([NSFontAttributeName: UIFont(name: "Chalkduster", size: 20)!], forState: UIControlState.Normal)

Edit: From the comment you posted under this answer, it seems as if you don't actually want to set the leftBarButtonItem but the backBarButtonItem because you don't want to implement a custom action beyond going back to the previous view controller.

So in that previous view controller (i.e. the view before you want to show your custom back button item), you can set your custom back button without an action like so:

let backButton = UIBarButtonItem(title: "< Back", style: UIBarButtonItemStyle.Plain, target: self, action: nil)
backButton.setTitleTextAttributes([NSFontAttributeName: UIFont(name: "Chalkduster", size: 20)!], forState: UIControlState.Normal)
navigationItem.backBarButtonItem = backButton

How can I change the font and color of the Navigation Bar back button

It's a UIBarButtonItem so set this property.

init() {
    UIBarButtonItem.appearance().tintColor = .red
    UIBarButtonItem.appearance().setTitleTextAttributes([NSAttributedString.Key.font: UIFont.systemFont(ofSize: 10)], for: .normal)
}

Or you can use this also,

init() {
    let standard = UINavigationBarAppearance()
    
    let button = UIBarButtonItemAppearance(style: .plain)
    button.normal.titleTextAttributes = [NSAttributedString.Key.font: UIFont.systemFont(ofSize: 10), NSAttributedString.Key.foregroundColor: UIColor.red]
    standard.buttonAppearance = button
}

Change font of back navigation bar button

To change the appearance of the text in all UIBarButtonItems appearing in all UINavigationBars, do the following in application:didFinishLaunchingWithOptions:

[[UIBarButtonItem appearanceWhenContainedIn:[UINavigationBar class], nil] setTitleTextAttributes:
    @{UITextAttributeTextColor:[UIColor blackColor],
     UITextAttributeTextShadowOffset:[NSValue valueWithUIOffset:UIOffsetMake(0, 1)],
     UITextAttributeTextShadowColor:[UIColor whiteColor],
     UITextAttributeFont:[UIFont boldSystemFontOfSize:12.0]
    }
     forState:UIControlStateNormal];

UPDATE: iOS7 friendly version

NSShadow *shadow = [[NSShadow alloc] init];
shadow.shadowOffset = CGSizeMake(0.0, 1.0);
shadow.shadowColor = [UIColor whiteColor];

[[UIBarButtonItem appearanceWhenContainedIn:[UINavigationBar class], nil]
 setTitleTextAttributes:
 @{NSForegroundColorAttributeName:[UIColor blackColor],
   NSShadowAttributeName:shadow,
   NSFontAttributeName:[UIFont boldSystemFontOfSize:12.0]
   }
 forState:UIControlStateNormal];

Swift:

NOTE: this changes ALL instances of UIBarButtonItem, not just those contained within a UINavigationBar

UIBarButtonItem.appearance()
               .setTitleTextAttributes([NSFontAttributeName : ExamplesDefaults.fontWithSize(22)], 
                                       forState: UIControlState.Normal)

Swift3:

UIBarButtonItem.appearance()
     .setTitleTextAttributes([NSFontAttributeName: UIFont(name: "FontName-Regular", size: 14.0)!], 
                             for: .normal) 

How to change font size of Navigation controller back button

You can change it inside AppDelegate:

func application(_ application: UIApplication, didFinishLaunchingWithOptions launchOptions: [UIApplicationLaunchOptionsKey: Any]?) -> Bool {

    UIBarButtonItem.appearance().setTitleTextAttributes([NSAttributedStringKey.font: UIFont(name: "SF Pro Display", size: 17)!], for: .normal)

    return true
}

Where you can customize the font and size of the Navigation bar buttons so it changes in all View Controllers.

Swift change font and color of back button

If you want to set same color to bar buttons implicitly then in your AppDelegate, in didfinishlaunchingwithoptions, write:

 UINavigationBar.appearance().tintColor = UIColor.white //your desired color here

Update :

Put this in AppDelegate,

 UIBarButtonItem.appearance().setTitleTextAttributes([NSFontAttributeName: UIFont(name: "Andes Rounded", size: 17)!], forState: .Normal) // your textattributes here

Update 2 :

  UIBarButtonItem.appearanceWhenContainedInInstancesOfClasses([UINavigationBar.classForCoder()]).setTitleTextAttributes(["attribute" : "value"], forState: .Normal)

Hope this will help :)

Change UINavigationBar back button text and font from AppDelegate using Swift

Swift 3.0,4.0

Simply you can achieve it with extension of UINavigationItem. According to many search there is no way to change left button text with app delegate.

extension UINavigationItem{

    override open func awakeFromNib() {
        super.awakeFromNib()

        let backItem = UIBarButtonItem()
        backItem.title = "Hello"

        if let font = UIFont(name: "Copperplate-Light", size: 32){
            backItem.setTitleTextAttributes([NSFontAttributeName:font], for: .normal)
        }else{

            print("Font Not available")
        }
        /*Changing color*/
        backItem.setTitleTextAttributes([NSForegroundColorAttributeName: UIColor.green], for: .normal)

        self.backBarButtonItem = backItem
    }

}

Update:

You can change Back Button arrow colour from AppDelegate on didFinishLaunchingWithOptions,

 /*It will change back arrow color only if you use  backItem.setTitleTextAttributes, else it will change whole text color*/
 UINavigationBar.appearance().tintColor = UIColor.orange

How to change back button text in Navigation item to picture in xcode

Add below code in viewDidLoad of viewController where you want to change back button title:

 let backButton = UIBarButtonItem()
 backButton.title = ""
 self.navigationController?.navigationBar.topItem?.backBarButtonItem = backButton

How do I change the title of the back button on a Navigation Bar

This should be placed in the method that calls the ViewController titled "NewTitle".
Right before the push or popViewController statement.

UIBarButtonItem *newBackButton = 
        [[UIBarButtonItem alloc] initWithTitle:@"NewTitle" 
                                         style:UIBarButtonItemStyleBordered 
                                        target:nil 
                                        action:nil];
[[self navigationItem] setBackBarButtonItem:newBackButton];
[newBackButton release];

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