Themes

Built-in color schemes, dark/light mode switching, and custom theme creation.

Last updated: February 16, 2026

Built-in Dark Themes

Blade ships with 5 dark themes and 3 light themes. Activate any by setting theme in your [colors] section.

Catppuccin Mocha

theme = "catppuccin-mocha"

Foreground

Background

Cursor

Selection

Dracula

theme = "dracula"

Foreground

Background

Cursor

Selection

Nord

theme = "nord"

Foreground

Background

Cursor

Selection

Solarized Dark

theme = "solarized-dark"

Foreground

Background

Cursor

Selection

Tokyo Night

theme = "tokyo-night"

Foreground

Background

Cursor

Selection

Built-in Light Themes

Blade includes 3 light themes for bright environments. Use them directly or let mode auto-switch.

Catppuccin Latte

theme = "catppuccin-latte"

Foreground

Background

Cursor

Selection

Solarized Light

theme = "solarized-light"

Foreground

Background

Cursor

Selection

Blade Light

theme = "blade-light"

Foreground

Background

Cursor

Selection

Dark / Light / System Mode

Use the mode setting to switch between dark and light appearances. When set to "system", Blade detects your OS preference (Windows Settings, macOS Appearance, or GNOME color-scheme).

# Follow OS dark/light preference
[colors]
mode = "system"
theme = "catppuccin-mocha"  # auto-switches to catppuccin-latte in light mode

When mode is set, Blade auto-pairs dark and light themes:

Dark Theme	Light Variant
`catppuccin-mocha`	`catppuccin-latte`
`solarized-dark`	`solarized-light`
`dracula`	`blade-light`
`nord`	`blade-light`
`tokyo-night`	`blade-light`

If you set mode = "light" without specifying a theme, Blade uses blade-light as the default light theme.

Font Color Override

Override the text color independently of the theme with font_color. This is applied after the theme, so the background and other colors come from the theme while the text uses your chosen color.

[colors]
theme = "solarized-dark"
font_color = "white"         # white, black, red, or any #RRGGBB hex

Activating a Theme

Set the theme key in your [colors] section. The theme overrides individual color settings.

[colors]
theme = "catppuccin-mocha"

Custom Themes

Create your own theme by placing a .toml file in the themes directory.

Theme file locations:

macOS / Linux: ~/.config/blade/themes/
Windows: %APPDATA%\blade\themes\

Custom theme format

# ~/.config/blade/themes/my-theme.toml

name = "my-theme"
author = "Your Name"

foreground = "#e0e0e0"
background = "#1a1a2e"
cursor = "#e0e0e0"
selection = "#333366"

# 16-color ANSI palette (indices 0-15)
palette = [
    "#1a1a2e", "#ff6b6b", "#6bff9e", "#ffd93d",
    "#6b9eff", "#c77dff", "#6bffe0", "#e0e0e0",
    "#333366", "#ff8585", "#85ffb5", "#ffe066",
    "#85b5ff", "#d9a3ff", "#85ffe8", "#ffffff"
]

Then activate it with theme = "my-theme" in your config.

Manual Color Overrides

Instead of using a theme, you can set individual colors directly in the [colors] section.

[colors]
# No theme - use manual colors
foreground = "#d4d4d4"
background = "#1e1e2e"
cursor = "#f5e0dc"
selection = "#45475a"

Note: When theme is set, it overrides the individual foreground, background, cursor, and selection values. Remove or comment out the theme line to use manual colors.