Themes and accents

Vaulterm’s look has four parts: v2 or v1 · Original (see Settings → Appearance), light or dark for the whole window, an accent colour that runs through buttons and highlights, and the terminal theme, the colours inside each terminal. Styles such as Minimal and Retro, and v2’s interface font, are on the same Settings page.

Pick a terminal theme

Open Settings → Terminal theme. The themes show as cards, each a small terminal in that theme’s colours. Hover over one to see it larger, with all 16 of its colours. Click a card to use it.

Show themes filters the cards: All, Dark or Light.

The first card, Match the app, is the default. In v2 it uses Vaulterm Ink in a dark window and Vaulterm Dusk in a light one; in v1 · Original, Vaulterm Dark or Vaulterm Light. The cursor and selection take your accent colour. In v2, with the Retro style and one of its CRT palettes chosen, it is that palette’s own theme: Matrix, Amber, Synthwave or Ice.

To try themes quickly, use the Command Center instead: type theme and a space, and move through the list. The whole window shows each theme as you pause on it. Enter keeps it, Escape puts yours back. See Preview a theme or an accent.

The themes

Dark	Light
Vaulterm Dark	Vaulterm Light
Vaulterm Production	Solarized Light
Dracula	Gruvbox Light
Nord	Rosé Pine Dawn
Catppuccin Mocha	GitHub Light
Solarized Dark	Catppuccin Latte
Tokyo Night	High Contrast Light
One Dark
Gruvbox Dark
Monokai
Rosé Pine
Everforest Dark
Kanagawa
GitHub Dark
Ayu Dark
Night Owl
Tomorrow Night
High Contrast Dark
Vaulterm Ink
Vaulterm Dusk
Matrix
Amber
Synthwave
Ice

Vaulterm Production is dark with a deep red background, made for production servers. See the next section. Matrix, Amber, Synthwave and Ice are Retro’s CRT looks, and come with Pro.

A theme per host or group

Give servers their own colours so you always know where you’re typing. The common setup: production red, staging something calm, everything else your normal theme.

1. On the Hosts page, open the Production group.
2. Open More options and set Terminal theme to Vaulterm Production.
3. Press Save.

Every terminal to a host in Production now uses that theme. The pane and tab look the same as any other; only the terminal’s colours change, so the difference is right where you’re typing.

The rules:

• A host’s own theme wins over its group’s, and a group’s over its parent’s. See Groups and inheritance.
• Default follows the group’s theme, or your terminal theme from Settings if no group sets one. In the list it reads “Default (the group’s or the app’s theme)”.
• A theme set on a host or group stays when you change your own terminal theme in Settings.

• The host and group editors use the same theme cards as Settings, with the hover preview. Default says what it resolves to, for example “Default: Vaulterm Production, from the group Production”.

App theme and accent

Open Settings → Appearance:

• Appearance (App theme in v1 · Original): System (follow your computer’s light or dark setting; the default), Light or Dark. Under one of Retro’s CRT palettes the window stays dark.
• Accent: the colour of buttons, focus rings and highlights. Twelve to choose from: Aurora (the default), Ocean, Sunset, Mint, Ember, Rose, Violet, Crimson, Forest, Lagoon, Indigo and Graphite. Most are two colours blended together.
• Increase contrast: stronger borders and text, for bright rooms or tired eyes.

The Command Center can change all three: type : and app theme, accent or contrast. Hovering an accent there previews it on the whole window.

In v2, Accent fill has two choices: Gradient, where an accent is two colours blended, and Solid, which keeps it flat.

Turn the accent gradient

In v1 · Original, with the Gradient style chosen, a dial under Style sets which way the accent’s gradient runs. Drag the dial, or focus it and use the arrow keys. It reads out where it points, such as “135°, toward the bottom right”. The default points toward the bottom right. v2 doesn’t have this dial.

Background opacity

Settings → Terminal has Background opacity, from 0 to 100% in steps of 5 (60% by default). It sets how strongly each terminal window takes its theme’s background, against Vaulterm’s own background. Lower lets more of Vaulterm’s own background through; 100% is the theme’s background exactly. If text would become hard to read, Vaulterm goes darker or lighter by itself.

Themes you imported before

Earlier versions of Vaulterm could import custom themes. Themes imported then still show among the cards in Settings → Terminal theme, and under Imported in the host and group editors, and hosts that use them keep them. Each has a delete button; deleting one says “Deleted Midnight. Hosts that used it now use the default.” New themes can’t be imported in this version.

If a host’s theme was imported on another computer and isn’t on this one, its editor shows “Missing theme (uses the default)”, and the terminal falls back to the group’s theme or your own.

Good to know

• Themes and accents are preferences for this computer, not vault data. A host’s or group’s theme is saved with the host in your vault.
• The terminal font and size are in Settings → Terminal.