Emacs: Set Color Theme

By Xah Lee. Date: 2012-10-11. Last updated: 2022-05-23.

emacs support color themes since Emacs 24 (released 2012-06)

set a theme

Alt+x load-theme, then press Tab to show a list of available themes.

Alternatively, Alt+x customize-themes to set a color theme.

emacs theme tango 2022-05-23 150040 — M-x customize-themes. Click to see the change immediately.

clear theme

To clear theme, Alt+x disable-theme. Press Tab for completion.

To find enabled themes, Alt+x describe-variable then type custom-enabled-themes

Set a Theme in Init

put this in your Emacs Init File:

(load-theme 'tango t)

Theme Gallery

Emacs: Theme Gallery

list of builtin themes

Here's list of emacs 28.1 themes (as of 2022-05-23).

adwaita
deeper-blue
dichromacy
leuven
light-blue
manoj-dark
misterioso
modus-operandi
modus-vivendi
tango-dark
tango
tsdh-dark
tsdh-light
wheatgrass
whiteboard
wombat

2012-10-11 Thanks to • Gabriel Saldaña [[2018-11-01 https://twitter.com/gabrielsaldana ]] • Torsten Wagner [~~https://plus.google.com/b/113859563190964307534/102520135125330850042/posts~~] • Steve Purcell [[2014-01-18 https://github.com/purcell ]] for tips.

Just Set of Background Color

Sometimes a color theme is too much. All you need is a mild background color.

To set background color, Alt+x set-background-color then type “honeydew”.

Alt+x list-colors-display to see color names.

put this in your Emacs Init File:

(if (display-graphic-p)
    (setq initial-frame-alist
          '(
            (tool-bar-lines . 0)
            (width . 106)
            (height . 60)
            (background-color . "honeydew")
            (left . 50)
            (top . 50)))
  (setq initial-frame-alist '( (tool-bar-lines . 0))))

(setq default-frame-alist initial-frame-alist)

(info "(elisp) Frame Parameters")

[see Emacs: Set Default Window Size]

[see Emacs: Font Setup]