According to android icon design guidelines ( here , see table #1), developer needs to provide status bar icons of next sizes: Status Bar 24 x 24 px (LDPI) 32 x 32 px (MDPI) 48 x 48 px (HDPI) While my measurements show that status bar always has 25 dp in height and expects icons of 25x25dp. This translates to these sizes: Status Bar 19 x 19 px (LDPI) 25 x 25 px (MDPI) 38 x 38 px (HDPI) Here is how I get those size: 25dp * 0.75 = 18.75 => 19px (LDPI) 25dp * 1 = 25 => 25px (MDPI) 25dp * 1.5 = 37.5 => 38px (HDPI) I have confirmed calculated sizes on several Android phones and on emulators. The question basically is: why guidelines use sizes different from what is really used by status bar? P.S. I actually need to break guidelines due to precise pixel control requirements. And I just was confused by this state of affairs. So explanation of why this the way it is would really help me. Source: Tips4all