Essential Android

Customizing Button style

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There are many possible ways of customizing the look of a Button. This example presents several options:

Option 0: Use ThemeOverlay (currently the easiest/quickest way)

Create a new style in your styles file:

styles.xml 

<resources>
    <style name=“mybutton” parent=”ThemeOverlay.AppCompat.Ligth”>
        <!-- customize colorButtonNormal for the disable color -->
        <item name="colorButtonNormal">@color/colorbuttonnormal</item>
        <!-- customize colorAccent for the enabled color -->
        <item name="colorButtonNormal">@color/coloraccent</item>
    </style>
</resources>

Then in the layout where you place your button (e.g. MainActivity):

activity_main.xml 

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    android:layout_gravity="center_horizontal"
    android:gravity="center_horizontal"
    android:orientation="vertical"
    android:paddingBottom="@dimen/activity_vertical_margin"
    android:paddingLeft="@dimen/activity_horizontal_margin"
    android:paddingRight="@dimen/activity_horizontal_margin"
    android:paddingTop="@dimen/activity_vertical_margin"
    tools:context=".MainActivity">

            <Button
                android:id="@+id/mybutton"
                android:layout_width="wrap_content"
                android:layout_height="wrap_content"
                android:text="Hello"
                android:theme="@style/mybutton"
                style="@style/Widget.AppCompat.Button.Colored"/>

</LinearLayout>

Option 1: Create your own button style

In values/styles.xml, create a new style for your button:

styles.xml 

<resources>
        <style name="mybuttonstyle" parent="@android:style/Widget.Button">
            <item name="android:gravity">center_vertical|center_horizontal</item>
            <item name="android:textColor">#FFFFFFFF</item>
            <item name="android:shadowColor">#FF000000</item>
            <item name="android:shadowDx">0</item>
            <item name="android:shadowDy">-1</item>
            <item name="android:shadowRadius">0.2</item>
            <item name="android:textSize">16dip</item>
            <item name="android:textStyle">bold</item>
            <item name="android:background">@drawable/button</item>
        </style>
    </resources>

Then in the layout where you place your button (e.g. in MainActivity):

activity_main.xml 

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    android:layout_gravity="center_horizontal"
    android:gravity="center_horizontal"
    android:orientation="vertical"
    android:paddingBottom="@dimen/activity_vertical_margin"
    android:paddingLeft="@dimen/activity_horizontal_margin"
    android:paddingRight="@dimen/activity_horizontal_margin"
    android:paddingTop="@dimen/activity_vertical_margin"
    tools:context=".MainActivity">

            <Button
                android:id="@+id/mybutton"
                android:layout_width="wrap_content"
                android:layout_height="wrap_content"
                android:text="Hello"
                android:theme="@style/mybuttonstyle"/>

</LinearLayout>

Option 2: Assign a drawable for each of your button states

Create an xml file into drawable folder called ‘mybuttondrawable.xml’ to define the drawable resource of each of your button states:

drawable/mybutton.xml 

<selector xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android">
    <item
        android:state_enabled="false"
        android:drawable="@drawable/mybutton_disabled" />
    <item
        android:state_pressed="true"
        android:state_enabled="true"
        android:drawable="@drawable/mybutton_pressed" />
    <item
        android:state_focused="true"
        android:state_enabled="true"
        android:drawable="@drawable/mybutton_focused" />
    <item
        android:state_enabled="true"
        android:drawable="@drawable/mybutton_enabled" />
</selector>

Each of those drawables may be images (e.g. mybutton_disabled.png) or xml files defined by you and stored in the drawables folder. For instance:

drawable/mybutton_disabled.xml 

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>

    <shape xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android" android:shape="rectangle">
        <gradient
            android:startColor="#F2F2F2"
            android:centerColor="#A4A4A4"
            android:endColor="#F2F2F2"
            android:angle="90"/>
        <padding android:left="7dp"
            android:top="7dp"
            android:right="7dp"
            android:bottom="7dp" />
        <stroke
            android:width="2dip"
            android:color="#FFFFFF" />
        <corners android:radius= "8dp" />
    </shape>

Then in the layout where you place your button (e.g. MainActivity):

activity_main.xml 

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    android:layout_gravity="center_horizontal"
    android:gravity="center_horizontal"
    android:orientation="vertical"
    android:paddingBottom="@dimen/activity_vertical_margin"
    android:paddingLeft="@dimen/activity_horizontal_margin"
    android:paddingRight="@dimen/activity_horizontal_margin"
    android:paddingTop="@dimen/activity_vertical_margin"
    tools:context=".MainActivity">

            <Button
                android:id="@+id/mybutton"
                android:layout_width="wrap_content"
                android:layout_height="wrap_content"
                android:text="Hello"
                android:background="@drawable/mybuttondrawable"/>

</LinearLayout>

Option 3: Add your button style to your App theme

You can override the default android button style in the definition of your app theme (in values/styles.xml).

styles.xml 

<resources>
     <style name="AppTheme" parent="android:Theme">
            <item name="colorPrimary">@color/colorPrimary</item>
            <item name="colorPrimaryDark">@color/colorPrimaryDark</item>
            <item name="colorAccent">@color/colorAccent</item>
              <item name="android:button">@style/mybutton</item>
     </style>
    
     <style name="mybutton" parent="android:style/Widget.Button">
             <item name="android:gravity">center_vertical|center_horizontal</item>
                <item name="android:textColor">#FFFFFFFF</item>
                <item name="android:shadowColor">#FF000000</item>
                <item name="android:shadowDx">0</item>
                <item name="android:shadowDy">-1</item>
                <item name="android:shadowRadius">0.2</item>
                <item name="android:textSize">16dip</item>
                <item name="android:textStyle">bold</item>
                <item name="android:background">@drawable/anydrawable</item>
     </style>
</resources>

Option 4: Overlay a color on the default button style programatically

Just find you button in your activity and apply a color filter: 

Button mybutton = (Button) findViewById(R.id.mybutton);
mybutton.getBackground().setColorFilter(anycolor, PorterDuff.Mode.MULTIPLY)

You can check different blending modes here and nice examples here.

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