Android: How to remove ActionBar without making Status Bar unreadable

Question

I'm new to android and one of my activities does not require the Action Bar but I'd like to keep the Status Bar. I have this style:

<style name="AppTheme.NoActionBar">
    <item name="windowActionBar">false</item>
    <item name="windowNoTitle">true</item>
</style>

This removes the Action Bar as expected and the Status Bar is there but now it's unreadable (white icons on an off-white background). How can I fix this? I'd be fine with changing the background of the Status Bar to black. Minimum SDK 19

Answer 1

For everyone looking for a solution, here's one :

In your styles.xml add this :

<style name="AppTheme.OnlyStatusBar">
        <item name="windowNoTitle">true</item>
        <item name="windowActionBar">false</item>
        <item name="android:windowFullscreen">true</item>
        <item name="android:windowContentOverlay">@null</item>
        <item name="android:statusBarColor">#FF000000</item>
    </style>

Then in your AndroidManifest.xml, for the choosen activity, add this :

<activity
            ...
            android:theme="@style/AppTheme.OnlyStatusBar">
           ...
</activity>

It will be showing the windows without any action Bar and still with the status bar. That's all, ez pz :) !

Answer 2

That is normal because the background is light and it's like a FullScreen Activity and the icons or other things are not readable.

In the new android, there is a new feature to do that(in values-v23/styles.xml):

<item name="android:windowLightStatusBar">true</item>

See: How to change the status bar notification icons' color/tint in android (marshmallow and above 23+)?

Answer 3

Well if you're using Android Studio, nowadays you have an option to create FullscreenActivity, that it doesn't include the ActionBar:

File -> New -> Activity -> Fullscreeen Activity