How can I switch themes in Visual Studio 2012

Question

The Visual Studio 2012 offers two themes, Light and Dark. I want to switch the theme to Dark, but I'm not able to find any menus or options to do that.

I found out a way importing settings from:

Microsoft Visual Studio 11.0\Common7\IDE\ FontsAndColorsThemes\1ded0138-47ce-435e-84ef-9ec1f439b749.vssettings

and the code editor is now in Dark theme but other windows are still in Light theme such as the Solution Explorer, Toolbox, and Toolbars.

What should I do to switch themes?

Answer 1

This worked for me ! Go to Tools->Options(Last Item)->Color theme Drop down and select any

Answer 2

For those who are using "High Contrast" windows themes but still want a regular Visual Studio theme you might notice that the theme selector drop down is disabled. You can still change it by doing the following...

1. Going to the registry key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0_Config\Themes (or whichever version of VS you are using)
2. Export the key of the theme you want (it's a bunch of random letters / numbers) to a .reg file.
3. Then copy the "high contrast" key's name (again random letters / numbers)
4. Delete the high contrast key and then rename the dark theme to the copied name
5. Then import the exported theme from the reg file.

This permanently sets the theme to the one you've chosen.

Answer 3

The Blue theme is now supported via Visual Studio update 2, and is accessed like the answer chosen for this question.

Answer 4

Also, you can use or create and share Visual Studio color schemes: https://studiostyl.es/