How to change check box tick color in android

You can use the attribute app:buttonTint of the AppCompatCheckBox from the android.support.v7 library.

<android.support.v7.widget.AppCompatCheckBox
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        app:buttonTint="@color/colorAccent"/>

Advantage: works also below API 21 and you don't need to redraw the checkbox.

As of API 21 you can use the Button Tint attribute

android:buttonTint="#FFFF00"

If you want to do this programmatically, then you simply do this:

final CheckBox cb = new CheckBox(getApplicationContext());
cb.setButtonTintList(getColorStateList(R.color.colorAccent));

Chris Stillwell's answer gave me the idea to try this as I couldn't simply set the colour using the attributes. :)

Unfortunately, changing the color of checkbox check mark isn't a simple attribute

Create a selector xml file in res\drawables\ folder with name cb_selector.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<selector xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android">
    <item android:state_checked="true" android:drawable="@drawable/checked" />
    <item android:state_checked="false" android:drawable="@drawable/unchecked" />
</selector>

In your layout file apply this file to your checkBox

<CheckBox
    android:id="@+id/cb"
    android:text="My CheckBox"
    android:button="@drawable/cb_selector"
    android:layout_width="wrap_content"
    android:layout_height="wrap_content"/>

Add a unchecked.png, and checked.png in your drawables folder. These are checked and unchecked image of checkbox.