Current view controller from AppDelegate?

Make an extension:

extension UIApplication {
    class func topViewController(base: UIViewController? = UIApplication.sharedApplication().keyWindow?.rootViewController) -> UIViewController? {
        if let nav = base as? UINavigationController {
            return topViewController(nav.visibleViewController)
        }
        if let tab = base as? UITabBarController {
            let moreNavigationController = tab.moreNavigationController

            if let top = moreNavigationController.topViewController where top.view.window != nil {
                return topViewController(top)
            } else if let selected = tab.selectedViewController {
                return topViewController(selected)
            }
        }
        if let presented = base?.presentedViewController {
            return topViewController(presented)
        }
        return base
    }
}

Usage:

if let rootViewController = UIApplication.topViewController() {
    //do sth with root view controller
}

If you have UINavigationController into appDelegate then use its property topViewController or visibleViewController

This might help

- (UIViewController *)topViewController{
  return [self topViewController:[UIApplication sharedApplication].keyWindow.rootViewController];
}

- (UIViewController *)topViewController:(UIViewController *)rootViewController
{
  if (rootViewController.presentedViewController == nil) {
    return rootViewController;
  }

  if ([rootViewController.presentedViewController isKindOfClass:[UINavigationController class]]) {
    UINavigationController *navigationController = (UINavigationController *)rootViewController.presentedViewController;
    UIViewController *lastViewController = [[navigationController viewControllers] lastObject];
    return [self topViewController:lastViewController];
  }

  UIViewController *presentedViewController = (UIViewController *)rootViewController.presentedViewController;
  return [self topViewController:presentedViewController];
}

Swift version:

extension UIApplication {
    class func topViewController(base: UIViewController? = UIApplication.shared.keyWindow?.rootViewController) -> UIViewController? {
        if let nav = base as? UINavigationController {
            return topViewController(base: nav.visibleViewController)
        }
        if let tab = base as? UITabBarController {
            if let selected = tab.selectedViewController {
                return topViewController(base: selected)
            }
        }
        if let presented = base?.presentedViewController {
            return topViewController(base: presented)
        }
        return base
    }
}

Taken from: https://gist.github.com/snikch/3661188

If your app's root view controller is a UINavigationController you can do this:

((UINavigationController*)appDelegate.window.rootViewController).visibleViewController;

Similarly, if it's a UITabBarController you can do this:

((UITabBarController*)appDelegate.window.rootViewController).selectedViewController;

Of course, explicit casting like this is dirty. Better would be to capture the reference yourself using strong types.