A drop-in replacement for the UIBarButtonItem class which passes the set target and action to the custom view if it is a UIControl. As I grew tired of having to pay attention to UIBarButtonItem objects having custom (control) views, I wrote an extending class which actually behaves the way (I think) the parent class should. All you have to do is…

ExtendedBarButtonItem.h

//
//  ExtendedBarButtonItem.h
//
//  Created by Thomas Vervest.
//  This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
//  http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/
//
 
#import <UIKit/UIKit.h>
 
@interface ExtendedBarButtonItem : UIBarButtonItem
 
@end

ExtendedBarButtonItem.m

//
//  ExtendedBarButtonItem.m
//
//  Created by Thomas Vervest.
//  This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
//  http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/
//
 
#import "ExtendedBarButtonItem.h"
 
@implementation ExtendedBarButtonItem
 
- (void)setAction:(SEL)action
{
    if (!action)
    {
        [self removeControlTarget];
    }
    
    [super setAction:action];
    
    if (action)
    {
        [self updateControlTarget];
    }
}
 
- (void)setTarget:(id)target
{
    if (!target)
    {
        [self removeControlTarget];
    }
    
    [super setTarget:target];
    
    if (target)
    {
        [self updateControlTarget];
    }
}
 
- (void)removeControlTarget
{
    if (self.target && self.action && [self.customView isKindOfClass:[UIControl class]])
    {
        UIControl *control = (UIButton*)self.customView;
        [control removeTarget:self.target
                       action:self.action
             forControlEvents:UIControlEventTouchUpInside];
    }
}
 
- (void)updateControlTarget
{
    if (self.target && self.action && [self.customView isKindOfClass:[UIControl class]])
    {
        UIControl *control = (UIButton*)self.customView;
        [control addTarget:self.target
                    action:self.action
          forControlEvents:UIControlEventTouchUpInside];
    }
}
 
@end