Set App Colors

Your app’s colors are set in app/src/main/res/values/colors.xml. Each color is a hex code, like #3881fa, or #de000000 if you want transparency (the first two characters are the opacity).

The file has three groups, one per theme:

Group	Used when	Names start with
Light	The app uses the light theme	nothing, e.g. accent
Dark	The app uses the dark theme	darkTheme, e.g. darkThemeAccent
AMOLED	The dark theme with pitch black backgrounds is on	amoledTheme, e.g. amoledThemeAccent

Set all three groups, so your app looks consistent whichever theme users pick.

What each color is for

Color	What it colors
primary, primaryDark	The top and bottom bars
accent	Buttons, selected items and other highlights
surface	Cards, sheets and dialogs. Also the launch screen background
background	The background of every screen
snackbarBackgroundColor, snackbarTextColor, snackbarButtonColor	The small messages that pop up at the bottom of the screen (snackbars)

Colors whose name starts with on, like onAccent or onSurface, are for text and icons placed on top of that color. Make sure they’re easy to read against it.

Material You

On Android 12 and newer, users can turn on Material You, which takes the colors from their wallpaper instead. Those colors are in app/src/main/res/values-v31/m3_colors.xml. You can leave that file as it is.

If you’d rather show your own colors by default, turn Material You off by default in Change General Settings. Users can still turn it on in the app’s settings.

Tip

Need a hand picking colors?

The Material Theme Builder generates a full palette from one color.