# How to copy the dark theme files in v8.3? **URL:** \ **Category:** Ignition\ **Tags:** perspective\ **Created:** [May 26, 2026, 2:48am UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/how-to-copy-the-dark-theme-files-in-v8-3/115696 "2026-05-26T02:48:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![nminchin](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/user_avatar/forum.inductiveautomation.com/nminchin/32/6911_2.png) [@nminchin](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/nminchin)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2026, 2:48am UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/how-to-copy-the-dark-theme-files-in-v8-3/115696/1 "2026-05-26T02:48:42Z")
The light and dark themes no longer have folders in the file structure for them. The issue with switching themes by changing the session theme prop in the client is that this unloads all of the styles and loads the new ones, causing the client to go to an unstyled state in the interim, which looks unprofessional. It also means that you can't apply a nice animation to the changeover to fade from one to the other. To solve this and use a standard method that other websites employ, you can include the dark theme variable value overrides within the one theme styles, and toggle the dark overrides class on and off ([JS Injection Hack Usefuls (JavaScript) - #50 by nminchin](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/js-injection-hack-usefuls-javascript/114714/50)) However, in order to do this, you need to move the dark style variable and class overrides into your main theme and prefix each selector to also require a "dark" class, but with these root theme folders now MIA, you have to grab these from v8.1 which may be outdated now and in the future. So, how can we pull out these files? Better yet, are there any plans in the future to support toggling dark mode (and other modes like colourblind) either via toggling a dark class on the root HTML element such as mentioned, or using the `data-theme` attribute method (better support for more than 2 themes) so that the entire styling isn't unloaded/reloaded? (The current stylesheet swap used is described by copilot as this: ![image](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/original/3X/3/3/33114245191255566aea1ced7cbc9451a85af6f0.png) Although it's more of a hybrid since the dark theme inherits from the light theme files..) ---
**Author:** ![pturmel](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/user_avatar/forum.inductiveautomation.com/pturmel/32/3295_2.png) [@pturmel](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/pturmel)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2026, 11:39am UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/how-to-copy-the-dark-theme-files-in-v8-3/115696/2 "2026-05-26T11:39:40Z")
The light and dark themes aren't files anymore, but unalterable resources fed directly from the system jars to the web clients. There's a discussion about this around here somewhere.... ---
**Author:** ![nminchin](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/user_avatar/forum.inductiveautomation.com/nminchin/32/6911_2.png) [@nminchin](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/nminchin)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2026, 11:51am UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/how-to-copy-the-dark-theme-files-in-v8-3/115696/3 "2026-05-26T11:51:03Z")
A colleague linked me to an API method that can retrieve this supposedly, but I haven't tried it yet (I haven't been able to get API calls to work as yet.. always failing with 403) ---
**Author:** ![dkhayes117](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/user_avatar/forum.inductiveautomation.com/dkhayes117/32/68344_2.png) [@dkhayes117](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/dkhayes117)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2026, 4:28pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/how-to-copy-the-dark-theme-files-in-v8-3/115696/4 "2026-05-26T16:28:11Z")
This might be the one [[IGN-13768] Perspective Custom Theming Not Working After 8.3 Migration - Ignition 8.3 Early Access - Inductive Automation Forum](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/ign-13768-perspective-custom-theming-not-working-after-8-3-migration/109114) ---
**Author:** ![pturmel](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/user_avatar/forum.inductiveautomation.com/pturmel/32/3295_2.png) [@pturmel](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/pturmel)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2026, 5:00pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/how-to-copy-the-dark-theme-files-in-v8-3/115696/5 "2026-05-26T17:00:55Z")
Yeah, the solution to that is the answer. ~~Somewhere~~ there's another user whining that they can't change `dark` and `light` anymore. Ah, further down in that topic...