How to add a Container View programmatically

Question

A storyboard "container view" is just a standard UIView object. There is no special "container view" type. In fact, if you look at the view hierarchy, you can see that the "container view" is a standard UIView:

To achieve this programmatically, you employ "view controller containment":

• Instantiate the child view controller by calling instantiateViewController(withIdentifier:) on the storyboard object.
• Call addChild in your parent view controller.
• Add the view controller's view to your view hierarchy with addSubview (and also set the frame or constraints as appropriate).
• Call the didMove(toParent:) method on the child view controller, passing the reference to the parent view controller.

See Implementing a Container View Controller in the View Controller Programming Guide and the "Implementing a Container View Controller" section of the UIViewController Class Reference.

---

For example, in Swift 4.2 it might look like:

override func viewDidLoad() {
    super.viewDidLoad()

    let controller = storyboard!.instantiateViewController(withIdentifier: "Second")
    addChild(controller)
    controller.view.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false
    view.addSubview(controller.view)

    NSLayoutConstraint.activate([
        controller.view.leadingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.leadingAnchor, constant: 10),
        controller.view.trailingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.trailingAnchor, constant: -10),
        controller.view.topAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.topAnchor, constant: 10),
        controller.view.bottomAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.bottomAnchor, constant: -10)
    ])

    controller.didMove(toParent: self)
}

Note, the above doesn't actually add a "container view" to the hierarchy. If you want to do that, you'd do something like:

override func viewDidLoad() {
    super.viewDidLoad()

    // add container

    let containerView = UIView()
    containerView.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false
    view.addSubview(containerView)
    NSLayoutConstraint.activate([
        containerView.leadingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.leadingAnchor, constant: 10),
        containerView.trailingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.trailingAnchor, constant: -10),
        containerView.topAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.topAnchor, constant: 10),
        containerView.bottomAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.bottomAnchor, constant: -10),
    ])

    // add child view controller view to container

    let controller = storyboard!.instantiateViewController(withIdentifier: "Second")
    addChild(controller)
    controller.view.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false
    containerView.addSubview(controller.view)

    NSLayoutConstraint.activate([
        controller.view.leadingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: containerView.leadingAnchor),
        controller.view.trailingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: containerView.trailingAnchor),
        controller.view.topAnchor.constraint(equalTo: containerView.topAnchor),
        controller.view.bottomAnchor.constraint(equalTo: containerView.bottomAnchor)
    ])

    controller.didMove(toParent: self)
}

This latter pattern is extremely useful if ever transitioning between different child view controllers and you just want to make sure one child's view is in the same location and the previous child's view (i.e. all the unique constraints for the placement are dictated by the container view, rather than needing to rebuild these constraints each time). But if just performing simple view containment, the need for this separate container view is less compelling.

---

In the examples above, I’m setting translatesAutosizingMaskIntoConstraints to false defining the constraints myself. You obviously can leave translatesAutosizingMaskIntoConstraints as true and set both the frame and the autosizingMask for the views you add, if you’d prefer.

---

See previous revisions of this answer for Swift 3 and Swift 2 renditions.

@Rob's answer in Swift 3:

    // add container

    let containerView = UIView()
    containerView.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false
    view.addSubview(containerView)
    NSLayoutConstraint.activate([
        containerView.leadingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.leadingAnchor, constant: 10),
        containerView.trailingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.trailingAnchor, constant: -10),
        containerView.topAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.topAnchor, constant: 10),
        containerView.bottomAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.bottomAnchor, constant: -10),
        ])

    // add child view controller view to container

    let controller = storyboard!.instantiateViewController(withIdentifier: "Second")
    addChildViewController(controller)
    controller.view.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false
    containerView.addSubview(controller.view)

    NSLayoutConstraint.activate([
        controller.view.leadingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: containerView.leadingAnchor),
        controller.view.trailingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: containerView.trailingAnchor),
        controller.view.topAnchor.constraint(equalTo: containerView.topAnchor),
        controller.view.bottomAnchor.constraint(equalTo: containerView.bottomAnchor)
        ])

    controller.didMove(toParentViewController: self)

Here is my code in swift 5.

class ViewEmbedder {

class func embed(
    parent:UIViewController,
    container:UIView,
    child:UIViewController,
    previous:UIViewController?){

    if let previous = previous {
        removeFromParent(vc: previous)
    }
    child.willMove(toParent: parent)
    parent.addChild(child)
    container.addSubview(child.view)
    child.didMove(toParent: parent)
    let w = container.frame.size.width;
    let h = container.frame.size.height;
    child.view.frame = CGRect(x: 0, y: 0, width: w, height: h)
}

class func removeFromParent(vc:UIViewController){
    vc.willMove(toParent: nil)
    vc.view.removeFromSuperview()
    vc.removeFromParent()
}

class func embed(withIdentifier id:String, parent:UIViewController, container:UIView, completion:((UIViewController)->Void)? = nil){
    let vc = parent.storyboard!.instantiateViewController(withIdentifier: id)
    embed(
        parent: parent,
        container: container,
        child: vc,
        previous: parent.children.first
    )
    completion?(vc)
}

}

Usage

@IBOutlet weak var container:UIView!

ViewEmbedder.embed(
    withIdentifier: "MyVC", // Storyboard ID
    parent: self,
    container: self.container){ vc in
    // do things when embed complete
}

Use the other embed function with non-storyboard view controller.

Details

• Xcode 10.2 (10E125), Swift 5

Solution

import UIKit

class WeakObject {
    weak var object: AnyObject?
    init(object: AnyObject) { self.object = object}
}

class EmbedController {

    private weak var rootViewController: UIViewController?
    private var controllers = [WeakObject]()
    init (rootViewController: UIViewController) { self.rootViewController = rootViewController }

    func append(viewController: UIViewController) {
        guard let rootViewController = rootViewController else { return }
        controllers.append(WeakObject(object: viewController))
        rootViewController.addChild(viewController)
        rootViewController.view.addSubview(viewController.view)
    }

    deinit {
        if rootViewController == nil || controllers.isEmpty { return }
        for controller in controllers {
            if let controller = controller.object {
                controller.view.removeFromSuperview()
                controller.removeFromParent()
            }
        }
        controllers.removeAll()
    }
}

Usage

class SampleViewController: UIViewController {
    private var embedController: EmbedController?

    override func viewDidLoad() {
        super.viewDidLoad()
        embedController = EmbedController(rootViewController: self)

        let newViewController = ViewControllerWithButton()
        newViewController.view.frame = CGRect(origin: CGPoint(x: 50, y: 150), size: CGSize(width: 200, height: 80))
        newViewController.view.backgroundColor = .lightGray
        embedController?.append(viewController: newViewController)
    }
}

Full sample

ViewController

import UIKit

class ViewController: UIViewController {

    private var embedController: EmbedController?
    private var button: UIButton?
    private let addEmbedButtonTitle = "Add embed"

    override func viewDidLoad() {
        super.viewDidLoad()

        button = UIButton(frame: CGRect(x: 50, y: 50, width: 150, height: 20))
        button?.setTitle(addEmbedButtonTitle, for: .normal)
        button?.setTitleColor(.black, for: .normal)
        button?.addTarget(self, action: #selector(buttonTapped), for: .touchUpInside)
        view.addSubview(button!)

        print("viewDidLoad")
        printChildViewControllesInfo()
    }

    func addChildViewControllers() {

        var newViewController = ViewControllerWithButton()
        newViewController.view.frame = CGRect(origin: CGPoint(x: 50, y: 150), size: CGSize(width: 200, height: 80))
        newViewController.view.backgroundColor = .lightGray
        embedController?.append(viewController: newViewController)

        newViewController = ViewControllerWithButton()
        newViewController.view.frame = CGRect(origin: CGPoint(x: 50, y: 250), size: CGSize(width: 200, height: 80))
        newViewController.view.backgroundColor = .blue
        embedController?.append(viewController: newViewController)

        print("\nChildViewControllers added")
        printChildViewControllesInfo()
    }

    @objc func buttonTapped() {

        if embedController == nil {
            embedController = EmbedController(rootViewController: self)
            button?.setTitle("Remove embed", for: .normal)
            addChildViewControllers()
        } else {
            embedController = nil
            print("\nChildViewControllers removed")
            printChildViewControllesInfo()
            button?.setTitle(addEmbedButtonTitle, for: .normal)
        }
    }

    func printChildViewControllesInfo() {
        print("view.subviews.count: \(view.subviews.count)")
        print("childViewControllers.count: \(childViewControllers.count)")
    }
}

ViewControllerWithButton

import UIKit

class ViewControllerWithButton:UIViewController {

    override func viewDidLoad() {
        super.viewDidLoad()
    }

    private func addButon() {
        let buttonWidth: CGFloat = 150
        let buttonHeight: CGFloat = 20
        let frame = CGRect(x: (view.frame.width-buttonWidth)/2, y: (view.frame.height-buttonHeight)/2, width: buttonWidth, height: buttonHeight)
        let button = UIButton(frame: frame)
        button.setTitle("Button", for: .normal)
        button.addTarget(self, action: #selector(buttonTapped), for: .touchUpInside)
        view.addSubview(button)
    }

    override func viewWillLayoutSubviews() {
        addButon()
    }

    @objc func buttonTapped() {
        print("Button tapped in \(self)")
    }
}

Results