Is there any way to modify the tab bar source code so it accepts color icons and displays them as such? Thanks.

If you're talking Android, I have no clue. With respect to iOS... It would depend on how deep you want to go. Member Jeff (MGoBlue) a while back wrote a tutorial on creating a custom icon for the 'center' button of a tab bar. It's a little outdated, and the code may need some massaging, but the method is sound and if you don't mind a few extra objects and some math, you could create specific buttons for each location re-using some of his code: http://www.smugwimp.com/btMods/Tab_Bar_With_Custom_Center_Tab.pdf if you want to make 'apple spec' icons, I wrote a nifty how to using 'pixelmator': http://www.smugwimp.com/btMods/pixelTabIcons.pdf Also, I could be wrong, but I thought Chris' tabbar plugin allowed color icons... Hope this helps! Cheers! -- Smug

Some code that may help for iOS ... An example is here https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/swcg-wildlife-care/id993627300?mt=8 Obviously you will need to generate your own UIColor codes - http://uicolor.org Some of the code I used is below, you may need to try out a few statements one at time to see what difference it makes. // Go to the BT_tabBarController.m // Under the view did load method add the following // Set the "bar" tint color - does not work with ios 6, so use the if statement below! if ([self.tabBar respondsToSelector:@selector(setBarTintColor:)]) { [[UITabBar appearance] setBarTintColor:[UIColor colorWithRed:142/255.0f green:188/255.0f blue:229/255.0f alpha:1.0f]]; } else { // Set the "tint" color - needed for iOS 6 [[UITabBar appearance] setTintColor:[UIColor colorWithRed:142/255.0f green:188/255.0f blue:229/255.0f alpha:1.0f]]; } // Set the active selected tabbar images to dark blue [[UITabBar appearance] setSelectedImageTintColor:[UIColor colorWithRed:23/255.0f green:51/255.0f blue:134/255.0f alpha:1.0f]]; // Set the text color of the title names // blue for selected [[UITabBarItem appearance] setTitleTextAttributes:@{ UITextAttributeTextColor : [UIColor colorWithRed:0/255.0f green:97/255.0f blue:138/255.0f alpha:1.0f] } forState:UIControlStateSelected]; // white for unselected [[UITabBarItem appearance] setTitleTextAttributes:@{ UITextAttributeTextColor :[UIColor whiteColor] } forState:UIControlStateNormal]; // This works - set the tab bar text color in ios 6 // Unselected Text [[UITabBarItem appearance] setTitleTextAttributes:[NSDictionary dictionaryWithObjectsAndKeys: [UIColor whiteColor], UITextAttributeTextColor, nil] forState:UIControlStateNormal]; // Selected text UIColor *titleHighlightedColor = [UIColor colorWithRed:0/255.0 green:97/255.0 blue:138/255.0 alpha:1.0]; [[UITabBarItem appearance] setTitleTextAttributes:[NSDictionary dictionaryWithObjectsAndKeys: titleHighlightedColor, UITextAttributeTextColor, nil] forState:UIControlStateHighlighted];