UITapGestureRecognizer - make it work on touch down, not touch up?

What I'm using the tap event for is very time-sensitive, so I'm curious if it's possible to make UITapGestureRecognizer activate when the user simply touches down, rather than requiring them to touch up as well?

Create your custom TouchDownGestureRecognizer subclass and implement gesture in touchesBegan:

TouchDownGestureRecognizer.h

#import <UIKit/UIKit.h>

@interface TouchDownGestureRecognizer : UIGestureRecognizer

@end

TouchDownGestureRecognizer.m

#import "TouchDownGestureRecognizer.h"
#import <UIKit/UIGestureRecognizerSubclass.h>

@implementation TouchDownGestureRecognizer
-(void)touchesBegan:(NSSet *)touches withEvent:(UIEvent *)event{
    if (self.state == UIGestureRecognizerStatePossible) {
        self.state = UIGestureRecognizerStateRecognized;
    }
}

-(void)touchesMoved:(NSSet *)touches withEvent:(UIEvent *)event{
    self.state = UIGestureRecognizerStateFailed;
}

-(void)touchesEnded:(NSSet *)touches withEvent:(UIEvent *)event{
    self.state = UIGestureRecognizerStateFailed;
}


@end

implementation:

#import "TouchDownGestureRecognizer.h"
    TouchDownGestureRecognizer *touchDown = [[TouchDownGestureRecognizer alloc] initWithTarget:self action:@selector(handleTouchDown:)];
    [yourView addGestureRecognizer:touchDown];

-(void)handleTouchDown:(TouchDownGestureRecognizer *)touchDown{
    NSLog(@"Down");
}

---

Swift implementation:

import UIKit
import UIKit.UIGestureRecognizerSubclass

class TouchDownGestureRecognizer: UIGestureRecognizer
{
    override func touchesBegan(touches: Set<UITouch>, withEvent event: UIEvent)
    {
        if self.state == .Possible
        {
            self.state = .Recognized
        }
    }

    override func touchesMoved(touches: Set<UITouch>, withEvent event: UIEvent)
    {
        self.state = .Failed
    }

    override func touchesEnded(touches: Set<UITouch>, withEvent event: UIEvent)
    {
        self.state = .Failed
    }
}

---

Here is the Swift syntax for 2017 to paste:

import UIKit.UIGestureRecognizerSubclass

class SingleTouchDownGestureRecognizer: UIGestureRecognizer {
    override func touchesBegan(_ touches: Set<UITouch>, with event: UIEvent) {
        if self.state == .possible {
            self.state = .recognized
        }
    }
    override func touchesMoved(_ touches: Set<UITouch>, with event: UIEvent) {
        self.state = .failed
    }
    override func touchesEnded(_ touches: Set<UITouch>, with event: UIEvent) {
        self.state = .failed
    }
}

Note that this is a drop-in replacement for UITap. So in code like...

func add(tap v:UIView, _ action:Selector) {
    let t = UITapGestureRecognizer(target: self, action: action)
    v.addGestureRecognizer(t)
}

you can safely swap to....

func add(hairtriggerTap v:UIView, _ action:Selector) {
    let t = SingleTouchDownGestureRecognizer(target: self, action: action)
    v.addGestureRecognizer(t)
}

Testing shows it will not be called more than once. It works as a drop-in replacement; you can just swap between the two calls.