Improve UI Contrast or Add Support for Theming

danielvartan · July 29, 2025, 2:02am

Hi there,

The new UI color scheme in NetLogo 7 looks modern, clean, and color-blind-friendly. However, the light theme in particular lacks enough contrast, which can make reading and working in it for long periods difficult.

It would be great to either:

Improve the default theme’s contrast while maintaining color-blind-friendliness, or
Add support for custom themes

For example, using perceptually uniform palettes like Viridis could help balance accessibility and aesthetics. This would benefit users with visual fatigue or color vision deficiencies without sacrificing the interface’s visual appeal.

Thanks again for your hard work!

john-chen · July 29, 2025, 4:36am

There is a built-in dark mode support, and I think theme support is technically feasible. @jzkelter

jzkelter · July 29, 2025, 4:29pm

@danielvartan Thanks for this feedback! We are planning to add support for custom color themes. We are also open to adjusting the default theme to have better contrast. Which elements in particular do you think are not high enough contrast?

danielvartan · July 29, 2025, 5:24pm

Great news!

@jzkelter the contrast issue I mentioned mainly affects the plots and monitors. Using a slightly darker gray or warmer colors might help fix it.

Example (Light Theme):

For comparison (Classical Theme):