{"id":7957,"date":"2026-08-18T00:29:42","date_gmt":"2026-08-18T07:29:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/?p=7957"},"modified":"2026-08-18T00:29:42","modified_gmt":"2026-08-18T07:29:42","slug":"i-found-an-easy-way-to-make-gnome-more-colorful","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/?p=7957","title":{"rendered":"I Found an Easy Way to Make GNOME More Colorful"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/itsfoss.com\/content\/images\/2026\/08\/customized-desktop-1.webp\" alt=\"Rewaita\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><\/figure>\n<p>One thing that always comes up in the <a href=\"https:\/\/itsfoss.com\/comparison\/kde-vs-gnome\/\" rel=\"noreferrer\">GNOME vs KDE debate<\/a> is how easy it is to <a href=\"https:\/\/itsfoss.com\/kde-customization\/\" rel=\"noreferrer\">customize KDE<\/a>. You can <a href=\"https:\/\/itsfoss.com\/gnome-tricks-ubuntu\/\" rel=\"noreferrer\">surely customize GNOME<\/a> but not to the extent of KDE. <\/p>\n<p>But that doesn&#8217;t deter us GNOME users from trying new looks and visuals, does it? In that regard, I recently came across a super cool GUI tool that lets give an altogether different look to your GNOME desktop.<\/p>\n<p>Take a look at the screenshot below. Looks like Archcraft or Omarchy, right?<\/p>\n<figure class=\"kg-card kg-image-card\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/itsfoss.com\/content\/images\/2026\/08\/customized-desktop.webp\" class=\"kg-image\" alt=\"GNOME customized with Rewaita\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1080\" \/><\/figure>\n<p>That is the magic of Rewaita, a GUI app worth adding in your customization toolbox.<\/p>\n<h2>Rewaita: Add custom color tint to GNOME Adwaita<\/h2>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/github.com\/swordpuffin\/Rewaita\">Rewaita<\/a> is not a standalone theme or icon. It keeps GNOME\u2019s familiar Adwaita design but replaces its colours and adds optional visual effects like changing the transparency to windows.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"kg-card kg-image-card\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/itsfoss.com\/content\/images\/2026\/06\/rewaita_interface.png\" class=\"kg-image\" alt=\"Rewaita\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1700\" height=\"1300\" \/><\/figure>\n<p>As you open Rewaita, it very helpfully gives you a user guide to help you through the process of changing the theme on GNOME. <\/p>\n<p>Once you&#8217;re through that process (that I&#8217;ll describe later), it gives you a good range of choices that include 14 light themes and 24 dark ones (all hail dark mode), followed by 6 Window Control themes. Many of these themes are well-known standard themes around Linux, like <a href=\"https:\/\/github.com\/KDE\/breeze\" rel=\"noreferrer\">Breeze<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/github.com\/nordtheme\/nord\" rel=\"noreferrer\">Nord<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/catppuccin.com\/\" rel=\"noreferrer\">Catppuccin<\/a>, etc. <\/p>\n<p>Which is great because they&#8217;re all tried and tested to suit the popular tastes of Linux users. After all, most Linux ricing screenshots you see on various communities use those color themes. <\/p>\n<p>The Window Control themes are more of the same that include Breeze, Mint and MacOS-styled button themes.<\/p>\n<p>All you need to do is choose the theme, and the change is immediate in all newly opened windows.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"kg-card kg-video-card kg-width-regular\" data-kg-thumbnail=\"https:\/\/itsfoss.com\/content\/media\/2026\/06\/rewaita_in-action_thumb.jpg\" data-kg-custom-thumbnail=\"\">\n<div class=\"kg-video-container\">\n                <video src=\"https:\/\/itsfoss.com\/content\/media\/2026\/06\/rewaita_in-action.webm\" poster=\"image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP\/\/\/yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7\" width=\"1094\" height=\"805\" loop=\"\" autoplay=\"\" muted=\"\" playsinline=\"\" preload=\"none\"><\/video>\n<div class=\"kg-video-overlay\">\n                    <button class=\"kg-video-large-play-icon\" aria-label=\"Play video\">\n<p>                    <\/p><\/button>\n                <\/div>\n<div class=\"kg-video-player-container kg-video-hide\">\n<div class=\"kg-video-player\">\n                        <button class=\"kg-video-play-icon\" aria-label=\"Play video\">\n<p>                        <\/p><\/button><br \/>\n                        <button class=\"kg-video-pause-icon kg-video-hide\" aria-label=\"Pause video\">\n<p>                        <\/p><\/button><br \/>\n                        <span class=\"kg-video-current-time\">0:00<\/span>\n<div class=\"kg-video-time\">\n                            \/<span class=\"kg-video-duration\">0:16<\/span>\n                        <\/div>\n<p>                        <button class=\"kg-video-playback-rate\" aria-label=\"Adjust playback speed\">1\u00d7<\/button><br \/>\n                        <button class=\"kg-video-unmute-icon\" aria-label=\"Unmute\"><\/button><\/p>\n<p>                        <br \/>\n                        <button class=\"kg-video-mute-icon kg-video-hide\" aria-label=\"Mute\"><\/button><\/p>\n<p>                        <\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p>Under the hood, it generates CSS overrides and related assets inside directories such as<\/p>\n<pre><code>~\/.config\/gtk-3.0\/\n~\/.config\/gtk-4.0\/\n~\/.local\/share\/themes\/<\/code><\/pre>\n<p>Note that it will only affect GTK applications. Qt (from KDE) and Electron apps may not adhere to the changed color theme.<\/p>\n<h2>Using Rewaita<\/h2>\n<p>To activate Rewaita, you have to ensure a few things first.<\/p>\n<p>Make sure you have the <em>gnome-shell-extensions<\/em> package installed, which allows you to extend the capabilities of GNOME.<\/p>\n<p>And then the <a href=\"https:\/\/extensions.gnome.org\/extension\/19\/user-themes\/\" rel=\"noreferrer\">User Themes extension<\/a> (I would also recommend installing the <a href=\"https:\/\/github.com\/mjakeman\/extension-manager\" rel=\"noreferrer\">Extension Manager<\/a>, that makes it easier and more fun to explore various extensions that GNOME has to offer), as well as the <a href=\"https:\/\/github.com\/GNOME\/gnome-tweaks\" rel=\"noreferrer\">GNOME Tweaks<\/a> application (where you actually choose the theme).<\/p>\n<figure class=\"kg-card kg-image-card\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/itsfoss.com\/content\/images\/2026\/06\/rewaita_gnome-user-theme-extension.png\" class=\"kg-image\" alt=\"GNOME User Theme Extension\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1700\" height=\"1300\" \/><\/figure>\n<div class=\"kg-card kg-button-card kg-align-center\"><a href=\"https:\/\/github.com\/swordpuffin\/Rewaita\" class=\"kg-btn kg-btn-accent\">Get Rewaita<\/a><\/div>\n<p>When you&#8217;re done with all that, finally install <a href=\"https:\/\/github.com\/swordpuffin\/Rewaita\" rel=\"noreferrer\">Rewaita<\/a>, which is <a href=\"https:\/\/flathub.org\/en\/apps\/io.github.swordpuffin.rewaita\">available on Flathub<\/a>. If you prefer terminal, here is the command:<\/p>\n<pre><code>flatpak install io.github.swordpuffin.rewaita<\/code><\/pre>\n<p>Other ways of installation on distributions such as Arch, OpenSUSE, and NixOS are listed <a href=\"https:\/\/github.com\/swordpuffin\/Rewaita#%EF%B8%8F-installation\" rel=\"noreferrer\">here<\/a>. <\/p>\n<p>After that, go into Rewaita and choose a theme. Once you do that, reboot your system, go into <a href=\"https:\/\/itsfoss.com\/gnome-tweak-tool\/\" rel=\"noreferrer\">GNOME Tweaks<\/a> and choose Rewaita as the Shell theme.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"kg-card kg-image-card\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/itsfoss.com\/content\/images\/2026\/08\/rewaita_gnome-tweaks.png\" class=\"kg-image\" alt=\"GNOME Shell theme change\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1340\" \/><\/figure>\n<h3>Flatpak Override<\/h3>\n<p>Since Flatpak applications are treated separately sandboxed, these settings are not applied to them by default. You can, however, make them apply by overriding the settings:<\/p>\n<pre><code>sudo flatpak override --filesystem=xdg-config\/gtk-3.0:rw\nsudo flatpak override --filesystem=xdg-config\/gtk-4.0:rw<\/code><\/pre>\n<p>The first command takes care of GTK-3.0 applications, the second does that for GTK-4.0.<\/p>\n<h2>More customization options<\/h2>\n<p>If you desire a more manual and methodical approach, you can even choose the exact colors that you want there to be on the interface on the Custom tab. <\/p>\n<p>Accent colors, interface colors, button colors, successful, dangerous or warning action colors, etc. can all be manually chosen, alongwith manual color naming and extra CSS code. You can even save these settings as themes on your system for future use.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"kg-card kg-image-card\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/itsfoss.com\/content\/images\/2026\/08\/rewaita_custom.png\" class=\"kg-image\" alt=\"Custom coloring options\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1700\" height=\"1300\" \/><\/figure>\n<h2>Fine Tuning<\/h2>\n<p>The Fine Tune section is another wonderful aspect where you can put in use some extra settings apart from the colors on your system. These include things like transparency, window borders, sharpening corners, etc. There&#8217;s an option to toggle Rewaita running in the background in case you swap between light and dark modes throughout the day.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"kg-card kg-image-card\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/itsfoss.com\/content\/images\/2026\/08\/rewaita_fine-tune.png\" class=\"kg-image\" alt=\"Fine tuning\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1700\" height=\"1300\" \/><\/figure>\n<h3>Firefox<\/h3>\n<p>You can choose to apply the theme to your Firefox window as well (great edge for the full open source application pack) by enabling &#8216;Generate Firefox CSS Theme&#8217; in the Fine Tune tab. After that, Firefox only needs to be fully quit and restarted for the settings to apply.<\/p>\n<h2>Wrapping Up<\/h2>\n<p>Rewaita is really, really, really convenient. It makes it extremely easy not to only apply pre-made themes, but also create custom themes of your own with colors and CSS code. <\/p>\n<p>More options are just a toggle switch away, and the user guide that is present right as you open the application is extremely helpful, telling you all that you need. <\/p>\n<p>Thoughtfully constructed and beautifully applied, Rewaita is a must use for anyone wanting to make GNOME look aesthetically pleasing.<\/p>\n<p><!--kg-card-begin: html--><\/p>\n<div class=\"repo-stats\" data-repo=\"https:\/\/github.com\/swordpuffin\/Rewaita\"><\/div>\n<p><!--kg-card-end: html--><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/feed.itsfoss.com\/link\/24361\/17422068.gif\" height=\"1\" width=\"1\" \/><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>One thing that always comes up in the GNOME vs KDE debate is how easy it is to customize KDE. You can surely customize GNOME but not to the extent&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7957","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-rss"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7957","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7957"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7957\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7957"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7957"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7957"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}