Originally, the dark theme was only available for Windows Phone users, then during the pre-release phase of Windows 10, the dark theme appeared for the first time as a hidden feature and it required to modify the Windows registry to make it work, which wasn’t an ideal solution. However, in time the software giant finally integrated the dark theme in the final release of Windows 10. Enabling the new dark theme in Windows 10 is pretty straightforward, the only thing you have to do is to open the Settings app (you can use the Windows + I keyboard shortcut), then navigate to Personalization, and the go to Colors. Under “Choose a color”, you only need to turn off the “Show color on Start, taskbar, and action center” option.
It’s worth pointing that as the name of the option describes, not everything in the operating system will go dark – just the Start menu, taskbar, and action center, everything else will conserve its colors, including apps, File Explorer, desktop applications, and Settings app. In addition, Microsoft is also bringing dark colors to some of its apps, including Groove Music, Xbox, and Microsoft Edge, and Office 2016 — Here’re the instructions to switch to the Dark Gray theme in Office. As such, if you want to go dark as much as possible in the operating system, you can change the theme for these apps as well. For example, in Groove Music, you can simply go to Settings, and scroll down to “Background” and change from Light to Dark.
On Microsoft Edge, go to the Settings menu and under “Choose a theme”, you change the from Light to Dark.
Other apps with dark theme also include Outlook Mail and Calendar version 17.6216.42271.0 or later. If you’re running the latest version of Mail and Calendar, you can go to Settings > Personalization, and under “Colors” choose between the Light theme and Dark theme options.
If there are other apps that support the new dark colors, often times it will appear under the app’s personalization settings. While it’s good to see Microsoft adding the ability for users to choose between a light or a dark theme in Windows 10 and on its apps, we also come across another inconsistency. As you can see in the instructions, each app and even in the operating system, the option is presented to users with different designs and names, when it should be consistent throughout the different products. Of course, this could be also part of Microsoft doing A/B testing, but have seen other inconsistency, such as on the context menu, which the company acknowledged as an issue and it’s slowly fixing it as part of the Windows 10 Threshold 2 that should arrive sometime in November. I personally would like to see an additional option in the Personalization settings, so that if you enable the dark theme in the operating system, any app that supports the black colors will automatically change. All content on this site is provided with no warranties, express or implied. Use any information at your own risk. Always backup of your device and files before making any changes. Privacy policy info.
