ContentOffset, ContentInset, and ContentSize of a UI ScrollView

Master the scroll view’s most important properties

Photo by Saketh Garuda on Unsplash

UIScrollView has a lot of instance properties, but contentInset, contentOffset, and contentSize are probably the most frequently used. One can do wonders with a complete understanding of these properties—starting with a stretchable toolbar to pinch in pinch out of images and a lot of other fun stuff.

• contentOffset is where the user is standing after scrolling the area. So this would change each and every time the user scrolls up and down. At times this can be set programmatically as well as in main thread, which will scroll up to given value if the position exists.

scrollView.setContentOffset(CGPoint(x: 50, y: 50), animated: true)

• contentInset is margin from UIScrollView to innerView. To give inner space to childView. This is given at the time the view is being laid out. This is set programmatically only. The default value is 0 for top, bottom, right, and left.

scrollView.contentInset = UIEdgeInsets(top: 7, left: 7, bottom: 7, right: 7)

• contentSize is the size of the content within the UIScrollView and how long it can be within scrollView. Sometimes this is dynamic like pagination or static like a contact list. This might be changing at runtime as well. This can be set programmatically as well.

scrollView.contentSize = CGSize(width: self.view.frame.size.width, height: 500)

This is how properties are placed over scrollView

UITableView and UICollectionView are derived from UIScrollView, so all of these properties are present for tableView and collectionView both and can be used multiple times as solutions to problems or to design new features.

Thanks for reading!