Retro Terminal Themes

20 retro terminal color themes spanning 1964–2010 — with a CRT-styled one-click picker right in your sidebar.

Your editor theme stays. Only the terminal time-travels.
IBM Mainframe · Punch Card · VT52 Amber · Apple II · DOS · Commodore 64 · ZX Spectrum · Macintosh · CGA · Amiga · Turbo Pascal · Windows 3.1 · Norton Commander · Windows 95 · Matrix · XP Luna · OS X Aqua · Ubuntu · Solarized

Screenshots

Every mockup below is rendered from the theme's actual palette.

🟠 DEC VT52 Amber · 1975

Warm amber phosphor glow of DEC video terminals.

🟢 Apple II Green · 1977

The classic green P1 phosphor of the Apple ][ monitor.

🔵 Commodore 64 · 1982

READY. — light blue text on the famous deep blue screen.

🟡 Turbo Pascal · 1990

Borland's IDE — yellow on blue, F1 for Help.

🟩 Hacker Green (Matrix) · 1999

Follow the white rabbit — #00ff41 rain on pure black.

🌒 Solarized Dark · 2010

Ethan Schoonover's precision palette, faithfully reproduced.

Installation

Easy Installation

Get started in under a minute:

1. Open the Extensions sidebar in Visual Studio Code (Ctrl+Shift+X / Cmd+Shift+X).
2. Search for Retro Terminal Themes.
3. Click Install.
4. Click the terminal icon in the Activity Bar (left edge) to open the theme browser.
5. Pick any theme — the terminal restyles instantly.
6. Enjoy! And consider leaving a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review.

Alternate Installation

Prefer the command palette?

1. Launch Quick Open — Ctrl+P (Windows/Linux) or Cmd+P (macOS).
2. Paste: ext install ToqirAhmad.retro-terminal-themes
3. Hit Enter, then Install.

All 20 Themes

Four eras, five decades, 20 machines worth of nostalgia.

Color Palette Reference

Every theme is a complete terminal palette — background, foreground, cursor, selection, and all 16 ANSI colors. A few of the highlights:

🟠 DEC VT52 Amber Role Color Hex Background #120B00 Foreground #FFB000 Cursor #FFCC33 Bright Red #FF8C1A Bright Green #FFB733 Bright Yellow #FFD11A Bright Blue #CC9933

🔵 Commodore 64 Role Color Hex Background #40318D Foreground #7869C4 Cursor #7869C4 Red #883932 Green #55A049 Yellow #BFCE72 Cyan #67B6BD

🌒 Solarized Dark Role Color Hex Background #002B36 Foreground #839496 Cursor #93A1A1 Red #DC322F Green #859900 Yellow #B58900 Blue #268BD2

FAQ

Does this change my editor theme? No — that's the whole point. It only writes terminal color keys into workbench.colorCustomizations, so your editor theme, UI colors, and syntax highlighting are untouched.

Will it overwrite my existing color customizations? Never. Themes are merged into your settings, and the extension remembers exactly which keys it wrote — Reset strips only those and leaves everything else alone.

Do the colors stay if I uninstall? Yes, because they live in your user settings. Run Retro Terminal: Reset Terminal Colors before uninstalling if you want the defaults back.

Which theme is best for presentations or screencasts? High-contrast picks like Hacker Green (Matrix), DEC VT52 Amber, Apple II Green, or IBM PC DOS read beautifully on a projector.

Why doesn't the font look as retro as the screenshots? Each theme also sets an era-appropriate terminal font (terminal.integrated.fontFamily). For the full effect, install the free fonts it prefers — VT323, IBM Plex Mono, Share Tech Mono, Courier Prime, and Ubuntu Mono — otherwise the terminal falls back to your default monospace. Prefer your own font? Set "retroTerminal.themeFont": false.

Can I request a theme? Absolutely — open an issue on the repository.

License

MIT © Toqir Ahmad

Made with 🖥️ and phosphor glow — if your terminal feels 40 years younger, consider leaving a ⭐ review on the Marketplace.