Setting accessibilityLabel for UITableView header text

Question

I am trying to find a way to set accessibilityLabel for my tableview's header text.

-(NSString *)tableView:(UITableView *)tableView titleForHeaderInSection:(NSInteger)section {        
    return @"Table View Header";
}

In my case, my accessibility label is different from the returned tableview's header text.

Answer 1

To set the accessibilityLabel property, write the text in the definition of the header view itself as I did in the code snippet hereunder by adding an accessibility element:

- (UIView *)tableView:(UITableView *)tableView viewForHeaderInSection:(NSInteger)section {

    CGRect headerViewFrame = CGRectMake(0.0, 0.0, tableView.frame.size.width, 44.0);
    UIView * headerView = [[UIView alloc] initWithFrame:headerViewFrame];

    UILabel * headerViewLabel = [[UILabel alloc] initWithFrame:headerViewFrame];
    headerViewLabel.text = @"Table View Header";
    [headerView addSubview: headerViewLabel];

    UIAccessibilityElement * a11yHeader = [[UIAccessibilityElement alloc] initWithAccessibilityContainer:headerView];
    a11yHeader.accessibilityFrameInContainerSpace = headerView.frame;
    a11yHeader.isAccessibilityElement = YES;
    a11yHeader.accessibilityLabel = @"my new header text for accessibility";
    a11yHeader.accessibilityTraits = UIAccessibilityTraitHeader;

    headerView.accessibilityElements = @[a11yHeader];

    return headerView;
}

Try this out and adapt it to your application.

Not that easy to go back to ObjC 🤯 but, now, you can set accessibilityLabel for UITableView header text by following this rationale. 🎉🎊🥳