Changing UITableViewCell height depending on size of UILabel subview

Question

I'm making a simple texting app for practice and the UITableView has lots of cells containing messages.

It works well with one-line messages but, as you can see on the bottom, with multi-line texts the size of the UITableViewCell starts getting in the way and cutting the message short. Just in case, here's the code for my cellForRowAtIndexPath method:

internal func tableView(tableView: UITableView, cellForRowAtIndexPath indexPath: NSIndexPath) -> UITableViewCell {
    var cell = UITableViewCell()
    if usernames[indexPath.row] == PFUser.currentUser()?.username {
        cell = tableView.dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier("text")!
    } else {
        cell = tableView.dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier("reply")!
        (cell.viewWithTag(2) as! UILabel).text = usernames[indexPath.row]
    }
    (cell.viewWithTag(1) as! UILabel).text = messages[indexPath.row]

    return cell
}

Basically I just need a solution that will enable this app to support multi-line messages. Thanks in advance for any help!

did you use UITableViewAutomaticDimension ? – KKRocks Apr 28 '17 at 05:40 — KKRocks, Apr 28 '17 at 05:40
No I'm not even sure what that is – James Apr 28 '17 at 05:41 — James, Apr 28 '17 at 05:41
check this : http://stackoverflow.com/a/40300589/3901620 – KKRocks Apr 28 '17 at 05:41 — KKRocks, Apr 28 '17 at 05:41
r u using autolayout or else for UI – Anbu.Karthik Apr 28 '17 at 05:43 — Anbu.Karthik, Apr 28 '17 at 05:43

leonardloo · Accepted Answer · 2017-04-28T22:06:58.410

2

Two things you need to do:

1) In viewDidLoad, specify these:

tableView.rowHeight = UITableViewAutomaticDimension
# The estimated row height number is not that important, just approximate it
tableView.estimatedRowHeight = 140

2) Define all constraints for your custom cell. Make sure top and bottom constraints specifically are defined.

The second step is particularly important.

edited Apr 28 '17 at 22:06

answered Apr 28 '17 at 05:43

leonardloo

1,753
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Ok I'll try this – James Apr 28 '17 at 05:44
Got this error: Detected a case where constraints ambiguously suggest a height of zero for a tableview cell's content view. We're considering the collapse unintentional and using standard height instead. – James Apr 28 '17 at 05:46
Did you place your views inside the content view first, then set the constraints? – leonardloo Apr 28 '17 at 05:47
Yes, that's the only way I know how to do it – James Apr 28 '17 at 05:48
Never mind, I actually saw the second step now and it worked! Thanks a lot! – James Apr 28 '17 at 05:53
Just one thing though, I am still getting the error that I got before – James Apr 28 '17 at 05:53
you are getting error but your problem is solved right? – elk_cloner Apr 28 '17 at 06:05

Pranit · Answer 2 · 2017-04-28T08:22:07.337

1

1) On Storyboard, In Attribute Inspector section. Set Lines = 0

2) In func viewDidLoad(),

    tableView.estimatedRowHeight = 50.0
    tableView.rowHeight = UITableViewAutomaticDimension

edited Apr 28 '17 at 08:22

answered Apr 28 '17 at 08:10

Pranit

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Asya · Answer 3 · 2017-04-28T12:46:50.040

You can use self-sizing table view cells and UITableViewAutomaticDimension. This is quite good article about it.

The trick to getting Auto Layout to work on a UITableViewCell is to ensure you have constraints to pin each subview on all sides — that is, each subview should have leading, top, trailing and bottom constraints. Then, the intrinsic height of the subviews will be used to dictate the height of each cell. You’ll do this now.

Then setup rowHeight to UITableViewAutomaticDimension:

tableView.rowHeight = UITableViewAutomaticDimension
tableView.estimatedRowHeight = 140

Changing UITableViewCell height depending on size of UILabel subview

3 Answers3