class QPalette

The QPalette class contains color groups for each widget state. More

Synopsis

Methods

Note

This documentation may contain snippets that were automatically translated from C++ to Python. We always welcome contributions to the snippet translation. If you see an issue with the translation, you can also let us know by creating a ticket on https:/bugreports.qt.io/projects/PYSIDE

Detailed Description

A palette consists of three color groups: Active, Disabled, and Inactive. All widgets in Qt contain a palette and use their palette to draw themselves. This makes the user interface easily configurable and easier to keep consistent.

If you create a new widget we strongly recommend that you use the colors in the palette rather than hard-coding specific colors.

The color groups:

  • The Active group is used for the window that has keyboard focus.

  • The Inactive group is used for other windows.

  • The Disabled group is used for widgets (not windows) that are disabled for some reason.

Both active and inactive windows can contain disabled widgets. (Disabled widgets are often called inaccessible or grayed out.)

In most styles, Active and Inactive look the same.

Colors and brushes can be set for particular roles in any of a palette’s color groups with setColor() and setBrush() . A color group contains a group of colors used by widgets for drawing themselves. We recommend that widgets use color group roles from the palette such as “foreground” and “base” rather than literal colors like “red” or “turquoise”. The color roles are enumerated and defined in the ColorRole documentation.

We strongly recommend that you use the default palette of the current style (returned by QGuiApplication::palette()) and modify that as necessary. This is done by Qt’s widgets when they are drawn.

To modify a color group you call the functions setColor() and setBrush() , depending on whether you want a pure color or a pixmap pattern.

There are also corresponding color() and brush() getters, and a commonly used convenience function to get the ColorRole for the current ColorGroup : window() , windowText() , base() , etc.

You can copy a palette using the copy constructor and test to see if two palettes are identical using isCopyOf() .

QPalette is optimized by the use of implicit sharing, so it is very efficient to pass QPalette objects as arguments.

Warning

Some styles do not use the palette for all drawing, for instance, if they make use of native theme engines. This is the case for both the Windows Vista and the macOS styles.

See also

QColor

class ColorGroup

Constant

Description

QPalette.Disabled

QPalette.Active

QPalette.Inactive

QPalette.Normal

synonym for Active

class ColorRole

Warning

This section contains snippets that were automatically translated from C++ to Python and may contain errors.

../../_images/palette.png

The ColorRole enum defines the different symbolic color roles used in current GUIs.

The central roles are:

Constant

Description

QPalette.Window

A general background color.

QPalette.WindowText

A general foreground color.

QPalette.Base

Used mostly as the background color for text entry widgets, but can also be used for other painting - such as the background of combobox drop down lists and toolbar handles. It is usually white or another light color.

QPalette.AlternateBase

Used as the alternate background color in views with alternating row colors (see QAbstractItemView::setAlternatingRowColors()).

QPalette.ToolTipBase

Used as the background color for QToolTip and QWhatsThis. Tool tips use the Inactive color group of QPalette , because tool tips are not active windows.

QPalette.ToolTipText

Used as the foreground color for QToolTip and QWhatsThis. Tool tips use the Inactive color group of QPalette , because tool tips are not active windows.

QPalette.PlaceholderText

Used as the placeholder color for various text input widgets. This enum value has been introduced in Qt 5.12

QPalette.Text

The foreground color used with Base. This is usually the same as the WindowText, in which case it must provide good contrast with Window and Base.

QPalette.Button

The general button background color. This background can be different from Window as some styles require a different background color for buttons.

QPalette.ButtonText

A foreground color used with the Button color.

QPalette.BrightText

A text color that is very different from WindowText, and contrasts well with e.g. Dark. Typically used for text that needs to be drawn where Text or WindowText would give poor contrast, such as on pressed push buttons. Note that text colors can be used for things other than just words; text colors are usually used for text, but it’s quite common to use the text color roles for lines, icons, etc.

There are some color roles used mostly for 3D bevel and shadow effects. All of these are normally derived from Window, and used in ways that depend on that relationship. For example, buttons depend on it to make the bevels look attractive, and Motif scroll bars depend on Mid to be slightly different from Window.

Constant

Description

QPalette.Light

Lighter than Button color.

QPalette.Midlight

Between Button and Light.

QPalette.Dark

Darker than Button.

QPalette.Mid

Between Button and Dark.

QPalette.Shadow

A very dark color. By default, the shadow color is Qt::black.

Selected (marked) items have two roles:

Constant

Description

QPalette.Highlight

A color to indicate a selected item or the current item. By default, the highlight color is Qt::darkBlue.

QPalette.Accent

A color that typically contrasts or complements Base, Window and Button colors. It usually represents the users’ choice of desktop personalisation. Styling of interactive components is a typical use case. Unless explicitly set, it defaults to Highlight.

QPalette.HighlightedText

A text color that contrasts with Highlight. By default, the highlighted text color is Qt::white.

There are two color roles related to hyperlinks:

Constant

Description

QPalette.Link

A text color used for unvisited hyperlinks. By default, the link color is Qt::blue.

QPalette.LinkVisited

A text color used for already visited hyperlinks. By default, the linkvisited color is Qt::magenta.

Note that we do not use the Link and LinkVisited roles when rendering rich text in Qt, and that we recommend that you use CSS and the setDefaultStyleSheet() function to alter the appearance of links. For example:

browser = QTextBrowser()
linkColor = QColor(Qt.red)
QString sheet = "a { text-decoration: underline; color: %1 }".arg(linkColor.name())
browser.document().setDefaultStyleSheet(sheet)

Constant

Description

QPalette.NoRole

No role; this special role is often used to indicate that a role has not been assigned.

__init__()

Constructs an empty palette object with no color roles set.

When used as the palette of a QWidget the colors are resolved as described by QWidget::setPalette().

See also

palette()

__init__(button)
Parameters:

buttonGlobalColor

Constructs a palette from the button color. The other colors are automatically calculated, based on this color. Window will be the button color as well.

__init__(button)
Parameters:

buttonQColor

Constructs a palette from the button color. The other colors are automatically calculated, based on this color. Window will be the button color as well.

__init__(palette)
Parameters:

paletteQPalette

Constructs a copy of p.

This constructor is fast thanks to implicit sharing.

__init__(button, window)
Parameters:

Constructs a palette from a button color and a window. The other colors are automatically calculated, based on these colors.

__init__(windowText, window, light, dark, mid, text, base)
Parameters:

Constructs a palette with the specified windowText, window, light, dark, mid, text, and base colors. The button color will be set to the window color.

__init__(windowText, button, light, dark, mid, text, bright_text, base, window)
Parameters:

Constructs a palette. You can pass either brushes, pixmaps or plain colors for windowText, button, light, dark, mid, text, bright_text, base and window.

See also

QBrush

accent()
Return type:

QBrush

Returns the accent brush of the current color group.

See also

ColorRole brush()

alternateBase()
Return type:

QBrush

Returns the alternate base brush of the current color group.

See also

ColorRole brush()

base()
Return type:

QBrush

Returns the base brush of the current color group.

See also

ColorRole brush()

brightText()
Return type:

QBrush

Returns the bright text foreground brush of the current color group.

See also

ColorRole brush()

brush(cr)
Parameters:

crColorRole

Return type:

QBrush

This is an overloaded function.

Returns the brush that has been set for the given color role in the current ColorGroup .

brush(cg, cr)
Parameters:
Return type:

QBrush

Returns the brush in the specified color group, used for the given color role.

button()
Return type:

QBrush

Returns the button brush of the current color group.

See also

ColorRole brush()

buttonText()
Return type:

QBrush

Returns the button text foreground brush of the current color group.

See also

ColorRole brush()

cacheKey()
Return type:

int

Returns a number that identifies the contents of this QPalette object. Distinct QPalette objects can have the same key if they refer to the same contents.

The cacheKey() will change when the palette is altered.

color(cr)
Parameters:

crColorRole

Return type:

QColor

This is an overloaded function.

Returns the color that has been set for the given color role in the current ColorGroup .

See also

brush() ColorRole

color(cg, cr)
Parameters:
Return type:

QColor

Returns the color in the specified color group, used for the given color role.

currentColorGroup()
Return type:

ColorGroup

Returns the palette’s current color group.

dark()
Return type:

QBrush

Returns the dark brush of the current color group.

See also

ColorRole brush()

highlight()
Return type:

QBrush

Returns the highlight brush of the current color group.

See also

ColorRole brush()

highlightedText()
Return type:

QBrush

Returns the highlighted text brush of the current color group.

See also

ColorRole brush()

isBrushSet(cg, cr)
Parameters:
Return type:

bool

Returns true if the ColorGroup cg and ColorRole cr has been set previously on this palette; otherwise returns false.

The ColorGroup cg should be less than NColorGroups , but you can use Current . In this case, the previously set current color group will be used.

The ColorRole cr should be less than NColorRoles .

isCopyOf(p)
Parameters:

pQPalette

Return type:

bool

Returns true if this palette and p are copies of each other, i.e. one of them was created as a copy of the other and neither was subsequently modified; otherwise returns false. This is much stricter than equality.

See also

operator=() operator==()

isEqual(cr1, cr2)
Parameters:
Return type:

bool

Returns true (usually quickly) if color group cg1 is equal to cg2; otherwise returns false.

light()
Return type:

QBrush

Returns the light brush of the current color group.

See also

ColorRole brush()

Return type:

QBrush

Returns the unvisited link text brush of the current color group.

See also

ColorRole brush()

linkVisited()
Return type:

QBrush

Returns the visited link text brush of the current color group.

See also

ColorRole brush()

mid()
Return type:

QBrush

Returns the mid brush of the current color group.

See also

ColorRole brush()

midlight()
Return type:

QBrush

Returns the midlight brush of the current color group.

See also

ColorRole brush()

__ne__(p)
Parameters:

pQPalette

Return type:

bool

Returns true (slowly) if this palette is different from p; otherwise returns false (usually quickly).

Note

The current ColorGroup is not taken into account when comparing palettes

See also

operator==()

__eq__(p)
Parameters:

pQPalette

Return type:

bool

Returns true (usually quickly) if this palette is equal to p; otherwise returns false (slowly).

Note

The following is not taken into account when comparing palettes:

See also

operator!=()

placeholderText()
Return type:

QBrush

Returns the placeholder text brush of the current color group.

Note

Before Qt 5.12, the placeholder text color was hard-coded as text() . color() with an alpha of 128 applied. In Qt 6, it is an independent color.

See also

ColorRole brush()

resolve(other)
Parameters:

otherQPalette

Return type:

QPalette

Returns a new QPalette that is a union of this instance and other. Color roles set in this instance take precedence. Roles that are not set in this instance will be taken from other.

See also

isBrushSet

resolveMask()
Return type:

int

setBrush(cr, brush)
Parameters:

Sets the brush for the given color role to the specified brush for all groups in the palette.

setBrush(cg, cr, brush)
Parameters:

This is an overloaded function.

Sets the brush in the specified color group, used for the given color role, to brush.

setColor(cr, color)
Parameters:

This is an overloaded function.

Sets the color used for the given color role, in all color groups, to the specified solid color.

setColor(cg, cr, color)
Parameters:

Sets the color in the specified color group, used for the given color role, to the specified solid color.

setColorGroup(cr, windowText, button, light, dark, mid, text, bright_text, base, window)
Parameters:

Sets a the group at cg. You can pass either brushes, pixmaps or plain colors for windowText, button, light, dark, mid, text, bright_text, base and window.

See also

QBrush

setCurrentColorGroup(cg)
Parameters:

cgColorGroup

Set the palette’s current color group to cg.

setResolveMask(mask)
Parameters:

mask – int

shadow()
Return type:

QBrush

Returns the shadow brush of the current color group.

See also

ColorRole brush()

swap(other)
Parameters:

otherQPalette

Swaps this palette instance with other. This function is very fast and never fails.

text()
Return type:

QBrush

Returns the text foreground brush of the current color group.

See also

ColorRole brush()

toolTipBase()
Return type:

QBrush

Returns the tool tip base brush of the current color group. This brush is used by QToolTip and QWhatsThis.

Note

Tool tips use the Inactive color group of QPalette , because tool tips are not active windows.

See also

ColorRole brush()

toolTipText()
Return type:

QBrush

Returns the tool tip text brush of the current color group. This brush is used by QToolTip and QWhatsThis.

Note

Tool tips use the Inactive color group of QPalette , because tool tips are not active windows.

See also

ColorRole brush()

window()
Return type:

QBrush

Returns the window (general background) brush of the current color group.

See also

ColorRole brush()

windowText()
Return type:

QBrush

Returns the window text (general foreground) brush of the current color group.

See also

ColorRole brush()