How to customize the background color of a UITableViewCell?

Here is the most efficient way I have come across to solve this problem, use the willDisplayCell delegate method (this takes care of the white color for the text label background as well when using cell.textLabel.text and/or cell.detailTextLabel.text):

- (void)tableView:(UITableView *)tableView willDisplayCell:(UITableViewCell *)cell forRowAtIndexPath:(NSIndexPath *)indexPath { ... }

When this delegate method is called the color of the cell is controlled via the cell rather than the table view, as when you use:

- (UITableViewCell *) tableView: (UITableView *) tableView cellForRowAtIndexPath: (NSIndexPath *) indexPath { ... }

So within the body of the cell delegate method add the following code to alternate colors of cells or just use the function call to make all the cells of the table the same color.

if (indexPath.row % 2)
{
    [cell setBackgroundColor:[UIColor colorWithRed:.8 green:.8 blue:1 alpha:1]];
}
else [cell setBackgroundColor:[UIColor clearColor]];

This solution worked well in my circumstance...

You need to set the backgroundColor of the cell's contentView to your color. If you use accessories (such as disclosure arrows, etc), they'll show up as white, so you may need to roll custom versions of those.

The best approach I've found so far is to set a background view of the cell and clear background of cell subviews. Of course, this looks nice on tables with indexed style only, no matter with or without accessories.

Here is a sample where cell's background is panted yellow:

UIView *backgroundView = [ [ [ UIView alloc ] initWithFrame:CGRectZero ] autorelease ];
backgroundView.backgroundColor = [ UIColor yellowColor ];
cell.backgroundView = backgroundView;
for ( UIView *view in cell.contentView.subviews ) 
{
    view.backgroundColor = [ UIColor clearColor ];
}

vlado.grigorov has some good advice - the best way is to create a backgroundView, and give that a colour, setting everything else to the clearColor. Also, I think that way is the only way to correctly clear the colour (try his sample - but set 'clearColor' instead of 'yellowColor'), which is what I was trying to do.

Customizing the background of a table view cell eventually becomes and "all or nothing" approach. It's very difficult to change the color or image used for the background of a content cell in a way that doesn't look strange.

The reason is that the cell actually spans the width of the view. The rounded corners are just part of its drawing style and the content view sits in this area.

If you change the color of the content cell you will end up with white bits visible at the corners. If you change the color of the entire cell, you will have a block of color spanning the width of the view.

You can definitely customize a cell, but it's not quite as easy as you may think at first.

My solution is to add the following code to the cellForRowAtIndexPath event:

UIView *solidColor = [cell viewWithTag:100];
if (!solidColor) {

    solidColor = [[UIView alloc] initWithFrame:cell.bounds];
    solidColor.tag = 100; //Big tag to access the view afterwards
    [cell addSubview:solidColor];
    [cell sendSubviewToBack:solidColor];
    [solidColor release];
}
solidColor.backgroundColor = [UIColor colorWithRed:254.0/255.0
                                             green:233.0/255.0
                                              blue:233.0/255.0
                                             alpha:1.0];

Works under any circumstances, even with disclosure buttons, and is better for your logic to act on cells color state in cellForRowAtIndexPath than in cellWillShow event I think.

If we can override your cell class, you can try this approach

override init(style: UITableViewCell.CellStyle, reuseIdentifier: String?) {
    super.init(style: style, reuseIdentifier: reuseIdentifier)
    selectionStyle = .none
}

override func setSelected(_ selected: Bool, animated: Bool) {
    super.setSelected(selected, animated: animated)
    backgroundColor = selected ? .red : .clear
}