Develop Reference

How to set background color of android app and background of action bar

I am trying to modify my app to have a dark blue action bar with a light blue background. So far I have only been able to make the entire app dark blue. How can I modify my code to keep the action bar the color it is now but make the background with the team numbers a light blue? Please note my apps minimum API is 14.
I am currently using the following code in my styles.xml:
<!-- Base application theme. -->
<style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.AppCompat.Light.DarkActionBar">
<item name="android:background">#color/teamLightBlue</item>
</style>
<!-- Activity themes -->
<style name="Theme.Base" parent="android:Theme.Light" />
<style name="Theme.Sample" parent="Theme.Base" />
<!-- the theme applied to the application or activity -->
<style name="CustomActionBarTheme"
parent="AppTheme">
<item name="android:actionBarStyle">#style/MyActionBarTheme</item>
</style>
<!-- ActionBar styles -->
<style name="MyActionBarTheme" parent="#android:style/Widget.Holo.Light.ActionBar">
<item name="android:background">#color/teamDarkBlue</item>
</style>

If you choose to use Theme.AppCompat, you can change Action Bar's background color using:
<item name="colorPrimary">#ffffff</item>
but if you choose the Holo one, you can change that color using
<item name="android:colorPrimary">#ffffff</item>
Hope this helps.

As far as I know your code is good instead of Widget.Holo.Light.ActionBar as its not part of AppCompat v7. Use this instead
<style name="CustomActionBarTheme" parent="AppTheme">
<item name="android:actionBarStyle" tools:ignore="NewApi">#style/MyActionBarTheme</item>
<item name="actionBarStyle">#style/MyActionBarTheme</item>
</style>
<style name="MyActionBarTheme" parent="#style/Widget.AppCompat.Light.ActionBar.Solid.Inverse">
<item name="android:background">#color/teamDarkBlue</item>
<item name="background">#color/teamDarkBlue</item>
</style>
It should work fine!

Setting custom action bar colors

I am writing my first app using Android Studio 1.02 and following an on-line tutorial. In the build.gradle file I have minSdkVersion 15. I'm having a problem with setting custom action bar colors.
As per the instructions I tried setting the theme in the manifest at the application level with android:theme="#android:style/Theme.Holo.Light". The program would compile but not run on my phone (Android 4.4.2). After reading threads on this forum and else where I was never able to resolve this, but the tutorial showed how to point to custom theme with android:theme="#style/CustomActionBarTheme">
This worked, but not entirely. Below is my custom theme and colors value xml. The colors are all the same on purpose, for testing. The background color works, but the text shows up as white, no matter what values I put in there.
The other thing I had to do here to get this to compile was change all of the parent= references from parent="#style/Widget.Holo.ActionBar.TabText" to parrent="android:Widget.Holo.ActionBar.TabText"
Any help is appreciated.
Greg
<style name="CustomActionBarTheme"
parent="#style/Theme.AppCompat.Light.DarkActionBar">
<item name="android:actionBarStyle">#style/MyActionBar</item>
<item name="android:actionBarTabTextStyle">#style/MyActionBarTabText</item>
<item name="android:actionMenuTextColor">#color/actionbar_text</item>
<!-- Support library compatibility -->
<item name="actionBarStyle">#style/MyActionBar</item>
</style>
<!-- ActionBar styles -->
<style name="MyActionBar"
parent="#style/Widget.AppCompat.Light.ActionBar.Solid.Inverse">
<item name="android:background">#color/actionbar_background</item>
<!-- Support library compatibility -->
<item name="background">#color/actionbar_background</item>
</style>
<!-- ActionBar title text -->
<style name="MyActionBarTitleText"
parent="android:TextAppearance.Holo.Widget.ActionBar.Title">
<item name="android:textColor">#color/actionbar_text</item>
</style>
<!-- ActionBar tabs text styles -->
<style name="MyActionBarTabText"
parent="android:Widget.Holo.ActionBar.TabText">
<item name="android:textColor">#color/actionbar_text</item>
</style>
<color name="disabled_text">#9FFF</color>
<color name="actionbar_background">#b43004</color>
<color name="background">#b43004</color>
<color name="actionbar_text">#b43004</color>

Android ActionBar not changing background color

I am trying to change the background color of my action bar but it doesnt change. My app is using the AppCompat theme if that affects anything.
Here is my theme that is being used. My app points to use this theme so that is not the problem
<!-- Base application theme. -->
<style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.AppCompat.Light">
<item name="actionBarStyle">#style/ActionBar</item>
</style>
<!-- Action Bar Styles -->
<style name="ActionBar" parent="Widget.AppCompat.ActionBar">
<item name="android:background">#color/blue</item>
<item name="background">#color/blue</item>
</style>

In your ActionBar style, delete the android:background, only keep the background attribute. Also make sure to implement your AppTheme in the application tag or in the activities extending the action bar in your AndroidManifest.xml file. I've also added the "#style/" attribute before Widget.AppCompat since its a default style defined in the android library.
Your code should look like this :
<!-- Base application theme. -->
<style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.AppCompat.Light">
<item name="actionBarStyle">#style/ActionBar</item>
</style>
<!-- Action Bar Styles -->
<style name="ActionBar" parent="#style/Widget.AppCompat.ActionBar">
<item name="background">#0000ff</item>
</style>

You can se this from code as well
ab.setBackgroundDrawable(new ColorDrawable(newcolor));
Just in case your xml is not working

According to this link, https://developer.android.com/reference/android/R.attr.html#background
it doesn't seem to take color resource, so you either give it a hex color value or create a drawable that uses the color you want. You could try the following alternative to see if it works.
<!-- Base application theme. -->
<style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.AppCompat.Light">
<item name="actionBarStyle">#style/ActionBar</item>
</style>
<!-- Action Bar Styles -->
<style name="ActionBar" parent="Widget.AppCompat.ActionBar">
<item name="android:background">#0000ff</item>
<item name="background">#0000ff</item>
</style>

Customize themes not working

i have to customize my whole application theme and i am trying to implement my custom theme.
i am able to implement custom theme but it is showing error when i apply it in manifest file.
here is my code for custome theme:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<resources>
<!-- the theme applied to the application or activity -->
<style name="CustomActionBarTheme"
parent="#style/Theme.Holo.Light.DarkActionBar">
<item name="android:actionBarStyle">#style/MyActionBar</item>
</style>
<!-- ActionBar styles -->
<style name="MyActionBar"
parent="#style/Widget.Holo.Light.ActionBar.Solid.Inverse">
<item name="android:background">#drawable/actionbar_background</item>
</style>
</resources>

You should provide more details about the error you are getting. At first sight I can see you are using Theme.Holo.Light.DarkActionBar, which I believe is only available for Android 4.x, so if you are targeting a previous version of Android you could get an error.
Try adding a style.xml file to each of the following folders:
res/values
res/values-v11
res/values-v14
Replace the referenced theme with Theme.Light in the style.xml file of the first folder. Use Theme.Holo.Light for v11 and leave Theme.Holo.Light.DarkActionBar in the style.xml file under v14.
Also bear in mind you cannot style the action bar under versions prior to Honeycomb (v11). Check the documentation for the ActionBar to get more details, in particular the information related to the AppCompat library.
I hope that helps. Otherwise, please provide more information about the error you are getting.

Change to
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<resources>
<!-- the theme applied to the application or activity -->
<style name="CustomActionBarTheme"
parent="#android:style/Theme.Holo.Light.DarkActionBar">
<item name="android:actionBarStyle">#style/MyActionBar</item>
</style>
<!-- ActionBar styles -->
<style name="MyActionBar"
parent="#android:style/Widget.Holo.Light.ActionBar.Solid.Inverse">
<item name="android:background">#drawable/actionbar_background</item>
</style>
</resources>
In manifest apply theme as
android:theme="#style/CustomActionBarTheme" >
Your min sdk in manifest should be 14. Use appcompact from the support library if you wish to support actionbar below api level 11.
Also check this
http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/ui/actionbar.html
https://developer.android.com/training/basics/actionbar/styling.html

<style name="CustomTheme" parent="android:Theme">
<item name="android:windowTitleSize">35dip</item>
<item name="android:windowTitleBackgroundStyle">#style/CustomWindowTitleBackground</item>
<item name="android:windowNoTitle">false</item>
<item name="android:windowBackground">#color/transparent</item>
</style>
<style name="CustomWindowTitleBackground">
<item name="android:background">#drawable/button_black</item>
</style>
put this code in style.xml and just change theme attribute of application tag in AndroidManifest.xml like
<application android:icon="#drawable/ic_launcher"
android:theme="#style/CustomTheme">
.
Thats it.

How to set custom ActionBar color / style?

I am using Android Navigation bar in my project,
I want to change the top color in action bar to something red, How can i do that?
I have something like this,
and i want something like this,
how can i achieve that?

You can define the color of the ActionBar (and other stuff) by creating a custom Style:
Simply edit the res/values/styles.xml file of your Android project.
For example like this:
<resources>
<style name="MyCustomTheme" parent="#android:style/Theme.Holo.Light">
<item name="android:actionBarStyle">#style/MyActionBarTheme</item>
</style>
<style name="MyActionBarTheme" parent="#android:style/Widget.Holo.Light.ActionBar">
<item name="android:background">ANY_HEX_COLOR_CODE</item>
</style>
</resources>
Then set "MyCustomTheme" as the Theme of your Activity that contains the ActionBar.
You can also set a color for the ActionBar like this:
ActionBar actionBar = getActionBar();
actionBar.setBackgroundDrawable(new ColorDrawable(Color.RED)); // set your desired color
Taken from here: How do I change the background color of the ActionBar of an ActionBarActivity using XML?

In general Android OS leverages a “theme” to allow app developers to globally apply a universal set of UI element styling parameters to Android applications as a whole, or, alternatively, to a single Activity subclass.
So there are three mainstream Android OS “system themes,” which you can specify in your Android Manifest XML file when you are developing apps for Version 3.0 and later versions
I am referring the (APPCOMPAT)support library here:--
So the three themes are
1. AppCompat Light Theme (Theme.AppCompat.Light)
AppCompat Dark Theme(Theme.AppCompat),
And a hybrid between these two ,AppCompat Light Theme with the Darker ActionBar.( Theme.AppCompat.Light.DarkActionBar)
AndroidManifest.xml and see the tag, the android theme is mentioned as:-- android:theme="#style/AppTheme"
Open the Styles.xml and we have base application theme declared there:--
<style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.AppCompat.Light.DarkActionBar">
</style>
We need to override these parent theme elements to style the action bar.
ActionBar with different color background:--
To do this we need to create a new style MyActionBar(you can give any name) with a parent reference to #style/Widget.AppCompat.Light.ActionBar.Solid.Inverse that holds the style characteristics for the Android ActionBar UI element. So definition would be
<style name="MyActionBar" parent="#style/Widget.AppCompat.Light.ActionBar.Solid.Inverse">
<item name="background">#color/red</item>
</style>
And this definition we need to reference in our AppTheme, pointing to overridden ActionBar styling as--
#style/MyActionBar
Change the title bar text color (e.g black to white):--
Now to change the title text color, we need to override the parent reference parent="#style/TextAppearance.AppCompat.Widget.ActionBar.Title">
So the style definition would be
<style name="MyActionBarTitle" parent="#style/TextAppearance.AppCompat.Widget.ActionBar.Title">
<item name="android:textColor">#color/white</item>
</style>
We’ll reference this style definition inside the MyActionBar style definition, since the TitleTextStyle modification is a child element of an ActionBar parent OS UI element. So the final definition of MyActionBar style element will be
<style name="MyActionBar" parent="#style/Widget.AppCompat.Light.ActionBar.Solid.Inverse">
<item name="background">#color/red</item>
<item name="titleTextStyle">#style/MyActionBarTitle</item>
</style>
SO this is the final Styles.xml
<resources>
<!-- Base application theme. -->
<style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.AppCompat.Light">
<!-- This is the styling for action bar -->
<item name="actionBarStyle">#style/MyActionBar</item>
</style>
<style name="MyActionBar" parent="#style/Widget.AppCompat.Light.ActionBar.Solid.Inverse">
<item name="background">#color/red</item>
<item name="titleTextStyle">#style/MyActionBarTitle</item>
</style>
<style name="MyActionBarTitle" parent="#style/TextAppearance.AppCompat.Widget.ActionBar.Title">
<item name="android:textColor">#color/white</item>
</style>
</resources>
For further ActionBar options Menu styling, refer this link

For Android 3.0 and higher only
When supporting Android 3.0 and higher only, you can define the action bar's background like this:
res/values/themes.xml
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<resources>
<!-- the theme applied to the application or activity -->
<style name="CustomActionBarTheme" parent="#style/Theme.Holo.Light.DarkActionBar">
<item name="android:actionBarStyle">#style/MyActionBar</item>
</style>
<!-- ActionBar styles -->
<style name="MyActionBar" parent="#style/Widget.Holo.Light.ActionBar.Solid.Inverse">
<item name="android:background">#ff0000</item>
</style>
</resources>
For Android 2.1 and higher
When using the Support Library, your style XML file might look like this:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<resources>
<!-- the theme applied to the application or activity -->
<style name="CustomActionBarTheme" parent="#style/Theme.AppCompat.Light.DarkActionBar">
<item name="android:actionBarStyle">#style/MyActionBar</item>
<!-- Support library compatibility -->
<item name="actionBarStyle">#style/MyActionBar</item>
</style>
<!-- ActionBar styles -->
<style name="MyActionBar"
parent="#style/Widget.AppCompat.Light.ActionBar.Solid.Inverse">
<item name="android:background">#drawable/actionbar_background</item>
<!-- Support library compatibility -->
<item name="background">#drawable/actionbar_background</item>
</style>
</resources>
Then apply your theme to your entire app or individual activities:
for more details Documentaion

You can change action bar color on this way:
<style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.AppCompat.Light.DarkActionBar">
<item name="colorPrimary">#color/green_action_bar</item>
</style>
Thats all you need for changing action bar color.
Plus if you want to change the status bar color just add the line:
<item name="android:colorPrimaryDark">#color/green_dark_action_bar</item>
Here is a screenshot taken from developer android site to make it more clear, and here is a link to read more about customizing the color palete

Another possibility of making.
actionBar.setBackgroundDrawable(new ColorDrawable(Color.parseColor("#0000ff")));

I can change ActionBar text color by using titleTextColor
<style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.AppCompat.Light.DarkActionBar">
<item name="titleTextColor">#333333</item>
</style>

Custom Color:
<style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.AppCompat.Light">
<item name="colorPrimary">#color/ColorPrimary</item>
<item name="colorPrimaryDark">#color/ColorPrimaryDark</item>
<!-- Customize your theme here. -->
</style>
Custom Style:
<style name="Theme.AndroidDevelopers" parent="android:style/Theme.Holo.Light">
<item name="android:selectableItemBackground">#drawable/ad_selectable_background</item>
<item name="android:popupMenuStyle">#style/MyPopupMenu</item>
<item name="android:dropDownListViewStyle">#style/MyDropDownListView</item>
<item name="android:actionBarTabStyle">#style/MyActionBarTabStyle</item>
<item name="android:actionDropDownStyle">#style/MyDropDownNav</item>
<item name="android:listChoiceIndicatorMultiple">#drawable/ad_btn_check_holo_light</item>
<item name="android:listChoiceIndicatorSingle">#drawable/ad_btn_radio_holo_light</item>
</style>
For More: Android ActionBar

As I was using AppCompatActivity above answers didn't worked for me. But the below solution worked:
In res/styles.xml
<resources>
<!-- Base application theme. -->
<style name="AppTheme" parent="Theme.AppCompat.Light.DarkActionBar">
<!-- Customize your theme here. -->
<item name="colorPrimary">#color/colorPrimary</item>
</style>
PS: I've used colorPrimary instead of android:colorPrimary

in the style.xml add this code
<resources>
<style name="MyTheme" parent="#android:style/Theme.Holo.Light">
<item name="android:actionBarStyle">#style/MyAction</item>
</style>
<style name="MyActionBarTheme" parent="#android:style/Widget.Holo.Light.ActionBar">
<item name="android:background">#333333</item>
</style>
</resources>

Use this - http://jgilfelt.github.io/android-actionbarstylegenerator/
Good tool to customize your actionbar with a live preview in couple of minutes.