iOS UIAlertController bold button changed in 8.3

UIAlertController with two buttons with styles set:

UIAlertActionStyle.Cancel
UIAlertActionStyle.Default

in iOS 8.2, the Cancel button is non-bold and Default is bold. In iOS 8.3 they have switched round

You can see it Apple's own apps e.g., Settings > Mail > Add Account > iCloud > enter invalid data, then it shows like this on 8.3:

Unsupported Apple ID

Learn More (bold) OK (non-bold)

whereas it was the other way round for 8.2.

Any workaround to make it like 8.2 again. Why has it changed?

From iOS 9 you can set the preferredAction value to the action which you want the button title to be bold.

    let cancelAction = UIAlertAction(title: "Cancel", style: .Cancel, handler: nil)
    let OKAction = UIAlertAction(title: "OK", style: .Default, handler: nil)
    alert.addAction(cancelAction)
    alert.addAction(OKAction)
    alert.preferredAction = OKAction
    presentViewController(alert, animated: true) {}

The OK button which is on the right will be in bold font.

This is an intentional change to the SDK. I have just had a response from Apple to this radar on the issue, stating that:

> This is an intentional change - the cancel button is to be bolded in alerts.

I can't find anything in the various change logs mentioning this, unfortunately.

So, we'll need to make changes to our apps in places to make some things make sense.

Since iOS 9, UIAlertController has a property called preferredAction. preferredAction has the following declaration:

var preferredAction: UIAlertAction? { get set }

>The preferred action for the user to take from an alert. [...] The preferred action is relevant for the UIAlertController.Style.alert style only; it is not used by action sheets. When you specify a preferred action, the alert controller highlights the text of that action to give it emphasis. (If the alert also contains a cancel button, the preferred action receives the highlighting instead of the cancel button.) [...] The default value of this property is nil.

---

The Swift 5 / iOS 12 sample code below shows how to display a UIAlertController that will highlight the text of a specified UIAlertAction using preferredAction:

let alertController = UIAlertController(title: "Title", message: "Message", preferredStyle: .alert)

let cancelAction = UIAlertAction(title: "Cancel", style: .cancel, handler: nil)
let okAction = UIAlertAction(title: "OK", style: .default, handler: { action in
    print("Hello")
})

alertController.addAction(cancelAction)
alertController.addAction(okAction)
alertController.preferredAction = okAction

present(alertController, animated: true, completion: nil)

I just checked in iOS 8.2: a first added button is non-bold and a second added button is bold. With this code a cancel button will be bold:

[alertController addAction:[UIAlertAction actionWithTitle:@"Ok"
                                                    style:UIAlertActionStyleDefault
                                                  handler:nil]];
[alertController addAction:[UIAlertAction actionWithTitle:@"Cancel"
                                                    style:UIAlertActionStyleCancel
                                                  handler:nil]];

And with this code a default button will be bold:

[alertController addAction:[UIAlertAction actionWithTitle:@"Cancel"
                                                    style:UIAlertActionStyleCancel
                                                  handler:nil]];
[alertController addAction:[UIAlertAction actionWithTitle:@"Ok"
                                                    style:UIAlertActionStyleDefault
                                                  handler:nil]];

I can't check in iOS 8.3 now but this behavior can be a reason.

Some words about objective-c and preferredAction for alertActions. If you use preferredAction you BOUTH alertAction must set as style:UIAlertActionStyleDefault. If some one will be set as style:UIAlertActionStyleCancel, preferredAction will be ignored

UIAlertController *alertController = [UIAlertController alertControllerWithTitle:@"All you base"
                                                                         message:@"Are belong to us!" preferredStyle:UIAlertControllerStyleAlert];

UIAlertAction* alertActionShowYes = [UIAlertAction actionWithTitle:@"YES!" style:UIAlertActionStyleDefault handler:^(UIAlertAction *action) {
    NSLog(@"I serve for my emperor!");
}];

UIAlertAction* alertActionNo = [UIAlertAction actionWithTitle:@"NO!" style:UIAlertActionStyleDefault handler:^(UIAlertAction *action) {
    NSLog(@"NOOOO it's not true!!");
}];

[alertController addAction:alertActionShowYes];
[alertController addAction:alertActionNo];

alertController.preferredAction = alertActionShowYes;
[alertController setPreferredAction:alertActionShowYes];
    
[self presentViewController:alertController animated:YES completion:nil];