How to zoom in/out an UIImage object when user pinches screen?

I would like to zoom in/out an UIImage object when the user performs the standard pinch action on my application. I'm currently using a UIImageView to display my image, if that detail helps in any way.

I'm trying to figure out how to do this, but no such luck so far.

Any clues?

As others described, the easiest solution is to put your UIImageView into a UIScrollView. I did this in the Interface Builder .xib file.

In viewDidLoad, set the following variables. Set your controller to be a UIScrollViewDelegate.

- (void)viewDidLoad {
    [super viewDidLoad];
    self.scrollView.minimumZoomScale = 0.5;
    self.scrollView.maximumZoomScale = 6.0;
    self.scrollView.contentSize = self.imageView.frame.size;
    self.scrollView.delegate = self;
}

You are required to implement the following method to return the imageView you want to zoom.

- (UIView *)viewForZoomingInScrollView:(UIScrollView *)scrollView
{
    return self.imageView;
}

In versions prior to iOS9, you may also need to add this empty delegate method:

- (void)scrollViewDidEndZooming:(UIScrollView *)scrollView withView:(UIView *)view atScale:(CGFloat)scale
{
}

The Apple Documentation does a good job of describing how to do this:

Another easy way to do this is to place your UIImageView within a UIScrollView. As I describe here, you need to set the scroll view's contentSize to be the same as your UIImageView's size. Set your controller instance to be the delegate of the scroll view and implement the viewForZoomingInScrollView: and scrollViewDidEndZooming:withView:atScale: methods to allow for pinch-zooming and image panning. This is effectively what Ben's solution does, only in a slightly more lightweight manner, as you don't have the overhead of a full web view.

One issue you may run into is that the scaling within the scroll view comes in the form of transforms applied to the image. This may lead to blurriness at high zoom factors. For something that can be redrawn, you can follow my suggestions here to provide a crisper display after the pinch gesture is finished. hniels' solution could be used at that point to rescale your image.

Shefali's solution for UIImageView works great, but it needs a little modification:

- (void)pinch:(UIPinchGestureRecognizer *)gesture {
    if (gesture.state == UIGestureRecognizerStateEnded
        || gesture.state == UIGestureRecognizerStateChanged) {
        NSLog(@"gesture.scale = %f", gesture.scale);

        CGFloat currentScale = self.frame.size.width / self.bounds.size.width;
        CGFloat newScale = currentScale * gesture.scale;

        if (newScale < MINIMUM_SCALE) {
            newScale = MINIMUM_SCALE;
        }
        if (newScale > MAXIMUM_SCALE) {
            newScale = MAXIMUM_SCALE;
        }

        CGAffineTransform transform = CGAffineTransformMakeScale(newScale, newScale);
        self.transform = transform;
        gesture.scale = 1;
    }
}

(Shefali's solution had the downside that it did not scale continuously while pinching. Furthermore, when starting a new pinch, the current image scale was reset.)

Below code helps to zoom UIImageView without using UIScrollView :

-(void)HandlePinch:(UIPinchGestureRecognizer*)recognizer{
    if ([recognizer state] == UIGestureRecognizerStateEnded) {
        NSLog(@"======== Scale Applied ===========");
        if ([recognizer scale]<1.0f) {
            [recognizer setScale:1.0f];
        }
        CGAffineTransform transform = CGAffineTransformMakeScale([recognizer scale],  [recognizer scale]);
        imgView.transform = transform;
    }
}

Keep in mind that you're NEVER zooming in on a UIImage. EVER.

Instead, you're zooming in and out on the view that displays the UIImage.

In this particular case, you chould choose to create a custom UIView with custom drawing to display the image, a UIImageView which displays the image for you, or a UIWebView which will need some additional HTML to back it up.

In all cases, you'll need to implement touchesBegan, touchesMoved, and the like to determine what the user is trying to do (zoom, pan, etc.).