Android statusbar icons color

Yes it's possible to change it to gray (no custom colors) but this only works from API 23 and above you only need to add this in your values-v23/styles.xml

<item name="android:windowLightStatusBar">true</item>

@eOnOe has answered how we can change status bar tint through xml. But we can also change it dynamically in code:

if (Build.VERSION.SDK_INT >= Build.VERSION_CODES.M) {
    View decor = getWindow().getDecorView();
    if (shouldChangeStatusBarTintToDark) {
        decor.setSystemUiVisibility(View.SYSTEM_UI_FLAG_LIGHT_STATUS_BAR);
    } else {
        // We want to change tint color to white again.
        // You can also record the flags in advance so that you can turn UI back completely if
        // you have set other flags before, such as translucent or full screen.
        decor.setSystemUiVisibility(0);
    }
}

if you have API level smaller than 23 than you must use it this way. it worked for me declare this under v21/style.

<item name="colorPrimaryDark" tools:targetApi="23">@color/colorPrimary</item>
        <item name="android:windowLightStatusBar" tools:targetApi="23">true</item>

Not since Lollipop. Starting with Android 5.0, the guidelines say:

Notification icons must be entirely white.

Even if they're not, the system will only consider the alpha channel of your icon, rendering them white

Workaround

The only way to have a coloured icon on Lollipop is to lower your targetSdkVersion to values <21, but I think you would do better to follow the guidelines and use white icons only.

If you still however decide you want colored icons, you could use the DrawableCompat.setTint method from the new v4 support library.

Setting windowLightStatusBar to true not works with Mi phones, some Meizu phones, Blackview phones, WileyFox etc. I've found such hack for Mi and Meizu devices. This is not a comprehensive solution of this perfomance problem, but maybe it would be useful to somebody.

And I think, it would be better to tell your customer that coloring status bar (for example) white - is not a good idea. instead of using different hacks it would be better to define appropriate colorPrimaryDark according to the guidelines