Windows 10: Different window bar colours for active and inactive windows?

G'day everyone

I'm using the Aerolite theme. I would like to have a distinct difference in colour between active and inactive windows (i.e. the window border and the window bar). In Windows 7 I was able to set the active window colour to blue and the inactive windows' colour to grey (similar to Windows Classic). Is there a way to do that in Windows 10? Simply having a darker and a lighter shade of the same colour won't be good enough -- I'd like to have two distinct colours.

Thanks
Samuel

:)

 

Why are active and inactive title bars and borders the same color?

Yes, if they chose to override the platform colour, and the platform makes a difference between active and inactive now, they should adjust their override accordingly, too. Does that require a separate Feedback item now?

 

Explorer title bar text color too bright grey

Hi Loraine, thanks for your answer.

The High contrast settings are changing all colours in a direction that I do not like at all.

It's for business and I try to stay more or less close to the Windows 7 settings.

The result with the original too bright title bars is:





After setting the AccentColorInactive to b8b4b0 (BGR), the result is:





Now you can now see 2 problems that I have:

• The File Explorer title bar gets a poor text contrast, while the Notepad title bar is OK. This is related to the presence of buttons in the File Explorer title bar.
  
  The text colour in the File Explorer title bar is the same as without the grey background.
  
  In the Notepad window the text colour gets darker than the original color.
  
  The addition of colors seems to happen in a different way.
  
• The Windows 10 Settings window has a blue title bar when active and a still a white title bar when inactive.
  
  The AccentColorInactive parameter does not set that color.

It would be nice if Microsoft could improve the colour experience.

Just an additional button "Show color on inactive title bar".

 

The aerolite themes are High Contrast. Many colors have conflicts with taskbar icons and live tiles. I think that why they removed these features. The colors can be changes with different theme files. I am building a mess full of themes to occupy my time these days. My latest was MDolphins and turned out pretty good.

 

If you upgrade to the November update, then there are already big differences between active and inactive colors. This was one of the major changes.

 

Hi ugcheleuce:

Not everyone appreciates High Contrast Themes but switching colors of Active and Inactive Title Bars almost works.
With the Nov updates, only the text dims on the inactive window; not terrible though, if you choose the right colors.

 

I don't quite understand what you mean by that. The Aero Lite theme that I installed does not appear to be a high contrast theme.

I installed it (yesterday, when I upgraded from Win7 to Win10) because WinAeroTweaker requires it. I used WinAeroTweaker to thicken the borders of my windows (that in itself is already a great help, because it helps me to see separate windows more clearly when they overlap).

I changed the opacity/glassiness of my taskbar yesterday, but I can't remember how I did it. *Think I don't use live tiles.

Do Windows theme files allow one to specify different colours for active and inactive windows?

Thanks
Samuel

 

I think that users like Edwin who use 10 PRO have the option screen above that he has posted. I use home so it is not available from what I see. So the only way I have found in Home is to change the palette colors in the HC themes.

 

Hi SonicBlue:

You need Brink's 'Personalization Classic' right click menu extension:

https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/6...dows-10-a.html

 

Wow thanks Edwin, I have been doing it the hard way by editing theme files by hand. I see this ads Inactive and active title colors. Will explore this some more.

 

You're welcome. Have fun! *Smile