The good old Windows Command Prompt has never been the most aesthetic of command line tools, especially when compared to the Linux and Mac terminals. Most of us think of the Command Prompt as a digital chalkboard with basic white-on-black aesthetics that hark back to the MS-DOS days. However, it doesn’t have to be that way. That’s because you can change and customize the Windows 10 Command Prompt colors and fonts by adding a much needed dash of color.
Customize Command Prompt Color and Font in Windows 10
In this tutorial, you will learn how to change the colors and font in the Windows 10 Command Prompt both temporarily (for the current session) and permanently. We will also show you how to revert those changes and return to the default white-on-black look in case you don’t like what you see. So without further ado, let’s check out how we can personalize the Command Prompt in Windows 10.
Personalize Command Prompt Color
- First off, open Command Prompt. For that, search for ‘cmd’ in the Windows Search Bar and click on the ‘Command Prompt’ option from the results.
- Now right-click on the top-bar of the Command Prompt window and select ‘Properties’.
- From the Properties window, select the ‘colors’ tab [1] and then choose the colors you want for the text and background using the pre-selected color options [2]. You can also enter your own RGB color combination [3] if you want.
- In the first case, I used the old-fashioned green-on-black terminal look by selecting green text while keeping the background black. In the second screenshot, you will see that we have reversed the default color scheme to get a very Notepad-like black-on-white look.
- Ahead of the launch of the ‘Terminal’ app in early 2019, Microsoft updated the Command Prompt properties with an additional ‘Terminal’ tab as part of Windows 10 build 18298. It contains several new customization options for the cursor and terminal color fields that let you specify RGB color values for the default foreground and/or background colors. Select the check-boxes next to ‘Use Separate Foreground/Background’ to get going.
- These colors are independent of the color palette you choose in the ‘Color’ tab. As you can see, I tweaked the fields to give the Command Prompt Window in my computer a bright orange background with white text in the foreground.
Personalize Command Prompt Font
- Back in the Properties dialog, switch to the ‘Font’ tab to change the characteristics of the font used in the Command Prompt. Here, you can change the font, as well as the text size. You can also click on the ‘Bold Fonts’ checkbox to add a bit more weight to any font that you choose.
You can play around with the settings and the different options to see what catches your fancy.
Add a Dash of Color to the Familiar Windows Command Prompt on Your Computer
So there it is folks! Now you know how to customize the Windows Command Prompt on your Windows 10 computer. If the PowerShell is your command line tool of choice and you want to personalize that with custom fonts and colors, you should check out our tutorial on how to change the Windows PowerShell color scheme on Windows 10. Of course, you can also try out the Windows Terminal application (download) if you frequently use command-line tools and shells like Command Prompt, PowerShell and WSL.
