For customizing my action bar I use code below in xml:
<style name="CustomActionbarTheme" parent="@style/Theme.AppCompat.Light">
<item name="actionBarTabStyle">@style/customTab</item>
<item name="actionBarStyle">@style/MyActionBar</item>
</style>
<style name="MyActionBar" parent="@style/Widget.AppCompat.ActionBar">
<item name="background">@drawable/title_bar</item>
</style>
<style name="customTab" parent="@style/Widget.AppCompat.ActionBar.TabView">
<item name="android:background">@drawable/tab_bg_selector</item>
</style>
I have no problem using api level 10 but when I run my code in higher api devices, action bars are in their default theme. I use support library v7 in my project.