📚 The Windows Theming Wiki

Welcome to The Windows Ricing Wiki. Here you can find guides and everything you need to get started on your Windows theming journey.

⚠️ WARNING: As a rule of thumb, before making any kind of change for the first time, create a system restore point.

• Table of Contents
  • Where to get Windows Themes
  • Patching your System
  • Applying custom themes
  • Changing default system font
  • Removing ribbon menu from Explorer
  • FAQ
  • Contributing

❓ Where to get Windows themes

DeviantArt is the primary platform for windows themes.

⚠️ WARNING: Websites other than DA are probably fake (resell paid themes) so just keep an eye for those types of websites.

🔧 Patching your system

In order to apply third-party Windows themes you need to patch your system. For this we recommend SecureUXTheme because it's the most reliable and safe. We DO NOT recommend UltraUXThemePatcher since nowadays it is quite unreliable and it also doesn't work properly on Windows 11.

How to patch using SecureUXTheme:

1. Download SecureUXTheme and open it AS ADMINISTRATOR (the file might be called ThemeTool.exe).
2. (optional, read below*) Enable Hook LogonUI then hit Install.
3. Reboot your PC.

(You only need to do this once, but might need to repeat it after some Windows updates!)

About Hook LogonUI*

Hook LogonUI and Rename DefaultColors both aim to fix colors being reset by LogonUI (for example when going into ctrl+alt+del) but of course do so in different ways. The tradeoff is simple:

• Rename DefaultColors may cause issues with updates and you might need to repatch more often.
• Hook LogonUI causes locking your computer to take a few more seconds.

It's up to you what you want to do, but if you just want to patch once and forget about it we suggest you use Hook LogonUI.

🎨 Applying custom themes

Since we only recommend you use SecureUXTheme for patching your system, this is a guide for applying themes with SecureUXTheme.

How to apply themes with SecureUXTheme:

1. Make sure you have patched your system (read above).
2. Install your themes by putting the .theme files and the adjacent folders into C:\Windows\Resources\Themes.
3. Open SecureUXTheme AS ADMINISTRATOR (the file might be called ThemeTool.exe).
4. Find your theme in the list and select it.
5. Click Patch and Apply.
6. And, voila! You are done!

(You need to do this for all the themes you want to apply!)

🇦 Changing default system font

By default, Windows uses the Segoe UI font. To change it, Segoe UI needs to be disabled in the registry, and a fallback font needs to be set, which will be used instead.

Use the following steps:

1. Create a backup of your current [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Fonts] and [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\FontSubstitutes], by selecting the keys (folders) in the registry editor, and calling File -> Export. Name the file something recognizable, such as "WindowFonts-DefaultBackup.reg".
2. Create a new file for your font setting, call it something like "WindowsFonts-FontName.reg". Make sure the extension is changed to .reg. In the file, paste the following contents, replacing the FontName with the name of the font you wish to use (make sure it's spelled exactly right, for example, "Segoe UI"="Arial"):

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Fonts]
"Segoe UI (TrueType)"=""
"Segoe UI Bold (TrueType)"=""
"Segoe UI Bold Italic (TrueType)"=""
"Segoe UI Italic (TrueType)"=""
"Segoe UI Light (TrueType)"=""
"Segoe UI Semibold (TrueType)"=""
"Segoe UI Symbol (TrueType)"=""

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\FontSubstitutes]

"Segoe UI"="FontName"

3. Right-click on the file, and select "Merge", and agree to the prompt that appears.
4. Restart the computer, and the new font should be applied.

🎀 Removing ribbon menu from Explorer

For this, you will have to use a program called OldNewExplorer

Extract it, and open the exe.

Select the "Use command bar" box and unselect the last two boxes.

Note: In Windows 11, the ribbon menu was replaced by a command bar, displaying buttons for copy, paste etc. To remove it, it needs to be replaced by the ribbon menu first. In Windows Terminal (or command prompt), call: reg.exe add "HKCU\Software\Classes\CLSID\{d93ed569-3b3e-4bff-8355-3c44f6a52bb5}\InprocServer32" /f /ve (alternatively, this registry key can be added manually). The ribbon menu should be back, making it possible to remove it with OldNewExplorer as described above.

🚧 Something doesn't work? Are you confused?

Read the handy-dandy FAQ we made!

❓ My theme doesn't apply!

This is a very common problem, you probably simply forgot to put the theme folder in the themes directory!

Below is an image representing how the files and folders should be placed:

❓ My theme is broken!

If you patched your system using UltraUX, please try using SecureUX instead. On numerous occasions we had users complain about themes not looking right and it was fixed with SecureUX. If this does not fix your issue then the theme might be old and/or made for another version of Windows.

❓ Will themes reduce my performance?

No! Every single theme is just a reskin of the original Windows theme.

❓ How do I make my own themes

Themes are made by editing the original Windows .msstyles, you can make a copy of it from your C:\Windows\Resources\Themes folder and use a style builder tool like Windows Style Builder (Keep in mind this is PAID SOFTWARE, it costs $30), or a free alternative like msstyleEditor in order to change the look and properties of the theme.

❓ I used OldNewExplorer, but now there's a menu that doesn't go away!

Press Ctrl+Shift+M to remove this menu. Make sure you have the window focused before pressing the keys.

❓ There's another bar at the bottom when using OldNewExplorer!

Press Alt+Shift+P while having the window focused.

❓ I saw screenshots where people had tabs on their Explorer, how?

You can do this using a shell extension called QTTabbar, which can be downloaded here.

QTTabbar includes other tricks like left navigation panel without folder names, we should have a decent QTTabbar guide written pretty soon.

❓ I am trying to change my QTTabbar toolbar color but there is a black box around it...

QTTabbar has a bug where it will only be able to recolor toolbar properly on white variant themes, if your theme applies darkmode by default, these black bars will not come off, sorry.

❓ There is a floating taskbar on the preview of the theme while mine is not...

For this you would need StartIsBack (StartAllBack for Windows 11), which can be downloaded here for Windows 10 and here for Windows 11 (Keep in mind the software is paid, both of them costing 5$).

After installation follow your theme's instructions in order to apply it's theme to SIB / SAB.

❓ How do I achieve blank titles on my window title-bar?

Use WinAeroTweaker to change titlebar font to blank.

You can download the blank font here!

✨ Contributing

We'd love if you could contribute to this project with a few fixes or additions! :D

License

This work is dual-licensed, while the wiki itself (text) being licensed under the CC-BY-4.0 license, the website itself is licensed under the MIT license.