Expo TabBar Icon Color Not Changing When Active: Fixing the Issue in Expo-router

Expo is a popular framework for building cross-platform mobile and web applications. It provides a set of tools and services to help developers quickly create and deploy applications. One of the most commonly used components in Expo is the TabBar component, which allows you to create a bottom navigation bar with multiple tabs. However, some users have reported an issue where the icon color of the selected tab does not change when it is active.

In this article, we will show you how to fix the issue of the Expo TabBar icon color not changing when active. We will provide a step-by-step guide that is easy to follow, even for entry-level users. By the end of this article, you will be able to customize the icon color of your TabBar components in Expo applications.

Understanding the Issue

The issue of the Expo TabBar icon color not changing when active is caused by a missing configuration in the TabBar component. By default, the TabBar component does not change the icon color of the selected tab. To fix this issue, we need to add a configuration that changes the icon color when the tab is active.

Fixing the Issue

To fix the issue of the Expo TabBar icon color not changing when active, we need to add a configuration to the TabBar component. Follow these steps to fix the issue:

1. Open your Expo project in your preferred code editor.
2. Navigate to the TabBar component that you want to modify.
3. Add the tabBarOptions property to the TabBar component. The tabBarOptions property is an object that contains the configuration for the TabBar component. Set the activeTintColor property to the color that you want to use for the active tab icon. For example:

import { TabBar } from 'expo-router';

function MyTabBar() {
  return (
    
  );
}

The activeTintColor property sets the color of the text and icons for the active tab. In the example above, we set the activeTintColor property to 'red', which means that the text and icons for the active tab will be displayed in red.

4. Save the changes and run the application. The icon color of the selected tab should now change when it is active.

Additional Customization

The tabBarOptions property allows you to customize the TabBar component in many ways. Here are some additional properties that you can use to customize the TabBar component:

• inactiveTintColor: This property sets the color of the text and icons for the inactive tabs. For example:

tabBarOptions={{
  inactiveTintColor: 'gray',
}}

• showLabel: This property determines whether to show the label for each tab. Set it to false to hide the label. For example:

tabBarOptions={{
  showLabel: false,
}}

• style: This property allows you to customize the style of the TabBar component. For example:

tabBarOptions={{
  style: {
    backgroundColor: 'black',
  },
}}

In this article, we have shown you how to fix the issue of the Expo TabBar icon color not changing when active. By adding the tabBarOptions property and setting the activeTintColor property, you can customize the icon color of the selected tab. We have also shown you some additional properties that you can use to customize the TabBar component. With this knowledge, you can create beautiful and customized TabBar components in your Expo applications.

References