How to Change the Accent and Highlight Colour in macOS

By default, macOS applies a multicolour accent palette that adapts to the specific application or retains Apple’s standard blue tone for interactive interface elements. However, you can personalise the visual aesthetic of your Mac by selecting custom accent and highlight colours. Changing these settings modifies the colour of system buttons, checkboxes, radio selections, pop-up menus, and highlighted text across native applications, allowing you to tailor your desktop environment to match your wallpaper or personal workflow aesthetic.

Understanding Accent vs Highlight Colours in macOS

Before customising your visual settings, it helps to distinguish between how macOS applies accent colours versus highlight colours:

• Accent Colour: Governs the appearance of interactive interface controls across macOS. This includes active push buttons, selected radio toggles, tick-boxes, progress bars, window control elements, and highlighted icons in Finder sidebar lists.
• Highlight Colour: Specifically controls the background fill colour that appears when you select text in documents, web pages, terminal sessions, or filenames in Finder. By default, macOS binds your highlight colour directly to your selected accent colour, but you can configure them independently.

How to Change the Accent Colour in macOS System Settings

You can modify your Mac’s interface accent colour in just a few clicks within the Appearance preferences:

1. Click the Apple menu () in the top-left corner of the menu bar, then select System Settings.
2. In the left-hand sidebar, click Appearance.
3. Locate the Accent colour section at the top of the pane.
4. Select one of the eight predefined colour swatches:
   • Multicolour: An adaptive mode where individual applications determine their own unique accent colours.
   • Blue: The traditional macOS interface standard.
   • Purple: A deep royal violet tone.
   • Pink: A vibrant magenta accent.
   • Red: A crisp crimson tone.
   • Orange: A warm amber hue.
   • Yellow: A bright gold shade.
   • Green: A subtle forest green accent.
   • Graphite (Silver/Grey): A neutral, distraction-free monochrome tone favoured by photographers and video editors.

The change takes effect across the entire operating system immediately without requiring a restart or log out.

Customising the Text Highlight Colour Independently

If you prefer an accent colour for interface controls but desire a high-contrast or distinct colour when selecting text:

1. In System Settings > Appearance, locate the Highlight colour dropdown menu positioned directly beneath the accent swatches.
2. By default, it is set to match your chosen accent colour. Click the dropdown to select any of the standard system hues.
3. To pick a completely bespoke shade, select Other… at the bottom of the dropdown menu.
4. The native macOS Colour Picker window appears. You can choose a custom shade using the colour wheel, colour sliders (RGB/CMYK/HSB), colour palettes, or the digital eyedropper tool to sample an exact tone from an open photograph or wallpaper.
5. Close the Colour Picker to apply your bespoke text selection highlight.

Allowing Wallpaper Tinting in Windows

Directly beneath the colour selection options in the Appearance pane is an additional visual refinement setting labelled Allow wallpaper tinting in windows:

• Enabled (Default): Causes translucent panels, toolbars, and background window chrome to subtly adopt the dominant color shades of your current desktop wallpaper.
• Disabled: Maintains completely neutral greyscale window backgrounds in both Light and Dark modes. Disabling wallpaper tinting is particularly recommended for visual artists, designers, and colour-grading professionals who require strictly neutral grey UI borders to prevent perceptual colour distortion.