Presenting a UIAlertController properly on an iPad using iOS 8

Question

You can present a UIAlertController from a popover by using UIPopoverPresentationController.

In Obj-C:

UIViewController *self; // code assumes you're in a view controller
UIButton *button; // the button you want to show the popup sheet from

UIAlertController *alertController;
UIAlertAction *destroyAction;
UIAlertAction *otherAction;

alertController = [UIAlertController alertControllerWithTitle:nil
                                                      message:nil
                           preferredStyle:UIAlertControllerStyleActionSheet];
destroyAction = [UIAlertAction actionWithTitle:@"Remove All Data"
                                         style:UIAlertActionStyleDestructive
                                       handler:^(UIAlertAction *action) {
                                           // do destructive stuff here
                                       }];
otherAction = [UIAlertAction actionWithTitle:@"Blah"
                                       style:UIAlertActionStyleDefault
                                     handler:^(UIAlertAction *action) {
                                         // do something here
                                     }];
// note: you can control the order buttons are shown, unlike UIActionSheet
[alertController addAction:destroyAction];
[alertController addAction:otherAction];
[alertController setModalPresentationStyle:UIModalPresentationPopover];

UIPopoverPresentationController *popPresenter = [alertController 
                                              popoverPresentationController];
popPresenter.sourceView = button;
popPresenter.sourceRect = button.bounds;
[self presentViewController:alertController animated:YES completion:nil];

Editing for Swift 4.2, though there are many blogs available for the same but it may save your time to go and search for them.

if let popoverController = yourAlert.popoverPresentationController {
    popoverController.sourceView = self.view //to set the source of your alert
    popoverController.sourceRect = CGRect(x: self.view.bounds.midX, y: self.view.bounds.midY, width: 0, height: 0) // you can set this as per your requirement.
    popoverController.permittedArrowDirections = [] //to hide the arrow of any particular direction
}

On iPad the alert will be displayed as a popover using the new UIPopoverPresentationController, it requires that you specify an anchor point for the presentation of the popover using either a sourceView and sourceRect or a barButtonItem

• barButtonItem
• sourceView
• sourceRect

In order to specify the anchor point you will need to obtain a reference to the UIAlertController's UIPopoverPresentationController and set one of the properties as follows:

alertController.popoverPresentationController.barButtonItem = button;

sample code:

UIAlertAction *actionDelete = nil;
UIAlertAction *actionCancel = nil;

// create action sheet
UIAlertController *alertController = [UIAlertController
                                      alertControllerWithTitle:actionTitle message:nil
                                      preferredStyle:UIAlertControllerStyleActionSheet];

// Delete Button
actionDelete = [UIAlertAction
                actionWithTitle:NSLocalizedString(@"IDS_LABEL_DELETE", nil)
                style:UIAlertActionStyleDestructive handler:^(UIAlertAction *action) {

                    // Delete
                    // [self deleteFileAtCurrentIndexPath];
                }];

// Cancel Button
actionCancel = [UIAlertAction
                actionWithTitle:NSLocalizedString(@"IDS_LABEL_CANCEL", nil)
                style:UIAlertActionStyleCancel handler:^(UIAlertAction *action) {
                    // cancel
                    // Cancel code
                }];

// Add Cancel action
[alertController addAction:actionCancel];
[alertController addAction:actionDelete];

// show action sheet
alertController.popoverPresentationController.barButtonItem = button;
alertController.popoverPresentationController.sourceView = self.view;

[self presentViewController:alertController animated:YES
                 completion:nil];

In Swift 2, you want to do something like this to properly show it on iPhone and iPad:

func confirmAndDelete(sender: AnyObject) {
    guard let button = sender as? UIView else {
        return
    }

    let alert = UIAlertController(title: NSLocalizedString("Delete Contact?", comment: ""), message: NSLocalizedString("This action will delete all downloaded audio files.", comment: ""), preferredStyle: .ActionSheet)
    alert.modalPresentationStyle = .Popover

    let action = UIAlertAction(title: NSLocalizedString("Delete", comment: ""), style: .Destructive) { action in
        EarPlaySDK.deleteAllResources()
    }
    let cancel = UIAlertAction(title: NSLocalizedString("Cancel", comment: ""), style: .Cancel) { action in

    }
    alert.addAction(cancel)
    alert.addAction(action)

    if let presenter = alert.popoverPresentationController {
        presenter.sourceView = button
        presenter.sourceRect = button.bounds
    }
    presentViewController(alert, animated: true, completion: nil)
}

If you don't set the presenter, you will end up with an exception on iPad in -[UIPopoverPresentationController presentationTransitionWillBegin] with the following message:

Fatal Exception: NSGenericException Your application has presented a UIAlertController (<UIAlertController: 0x17858a00>) of style UIAlertControllerStyleActionSheet. The modalPresentationStyle of a UIAlertController with this style is UIModalPresentationPopover. You must provide location information for this popover through the alert controller's popoverPresentationController. You must provide either a sourceView and sourceRect or a barButtonItem. If this information is not known when you present the alert controller, you may provide it in the UIPopoverPresentationControllerDelegate method -prepareForPopoverPresentation.

Update for Swift 3.0 and higher

    let actionSheetController: UIAlertController = UIAlertController(title: "SomeTitle", message: nil, preferredStyle: .actionSheet)

    let editAction: UIAlertAction = UIAlertAction(title: "Edit Details", style: .default) { action -> Void in

        print("Edit Details")
    }

    let deleteAction: UIAlertAction = UIAlertAction(title: "Delete Item", style: .default) { action -> Void in

        print("Delete Item")
    }

    let cancelAction: UIAlertAction = UIAlertAction(title: "Cancel", style: .cancel) { action -> Void in }

    actionSheetController.addAction(editAction)
    actionSheetController.addAction(deleteAction)
    actionSheetController.addAction(cancelAction)

//        present(actionSheetController, animated: true, completion: nil)   // doesn't work for iPad

    actionSheetController.popoverPresentationController?.sourceView = yourSourceViewName // works for both iPhone & iPad

    present(actionSheetController, animated: true) {
        print("option menu presented")
    }

Swift 5

I used "actionsheet" style for iPhone and "alert" for iPad. iPad displays in the center of the screen. No need to specify sourceView or anchor the view anywhere.

var alertStyle = UIAlertController.Style.actionSheet
if (UIDevice.current.userInterfaceIdiom == .pad) {
  alertStyle = UIAlertController.Style.alert
}

let alertController = UIAlertController(title: "Your title", message: nil, preferredStyle: alertStyle)

Edit: Per ShareToD's suggestion, updated deprecated "UI_USER_INTERFACE_IDIOM() == UIUserInterfaceIdiom.pad" check

2018 Update

I just had an app rejected for this reason and a very quick resolution was simply to change from using an action sheet to an alert.

Worked a charm and passed the App Store testers just fine.

May not be a suitable answer for everyone but I hope this helps some of you out of a pickle quickly.

Swift 4 and above

I have created an extension

extension UIViewController {
  public func addActionSheetForiPad(actionSheet: UIAlertController) {
    if let popoverPresentationController = actionSheet.popoverPresentationController {
      popoverPresentationController.sourceView = self.view
      popoverPresentationController.sourceRect = CGRect(x: self.view.bounds.midX, y: self.view.bounds.midY, width: 0, height: 0)
      popoverPresentationController.permittedArrowDirections = []
    }
  }
}

How to use:

let actionSheetVC = UIAlertController(title: "Title", message: nil, preferredStyle: .actionSheet)
addActionSheetForiPad(actionSheet: actionSheetVC)
present(actionSheetVC, animated: true, completion: nil)