ghostty

Generates a single-file colour theme for Ghostty, Mitchell Hashimoto's GPU-accelerated terminal emulator. The file lives in Ghostty's themes/ directory so it shows up alongside the built-in themes; you activate it with one config line.

Installation

Built into tinct — nothing to install separately. tinct generate -o ghostty works out of the box.

Quick start

tinct generate -i image -p ~/Pictures/wallpaper.jpg -o ghostty

Generated files

File	Path	Role
tinct.conf	~/.config/ghostty/themes/tinct.conf	Single-file theme — background, foreground, cursor/selection colours, and the 16-colour palette = N=#rrggbb ANSI table.

On macOS without $XDG_CONFIG_HOME, the path is ~/Library/Application Support/com.mitchellh.ghostty/themes/tinct.conf. On Windows it's %APPDATA%/ghostty/themes/tinct.conf.

Generated format

background = #1e1e2e
foreground = #cdd6f4

palette = 0=#45475a
palette = 1=#f38ba8
palette = 2=#a6e3a1
palette = 3=#f9e2af
palette = 4=#89b4fa
palette = 5=#f5c2e7
palette = 6=#94e2d5
palette = 7=#bac2de
palette = 8=#585b70
palette = 9=#f38ba8
palette = 10=#a6e3a1
palette = 11=#f9e2af
palette = 12=#89b4fa
palette = 13=#f5c2e7
palette = 14=#94e2d5
palette = 15=#a6adc8

Integration

Add one line to your Ghostty config (~/.config/ghostty/config on Linux, the equivalent platform path elsewhere):

theme = tinct

Ghostty searches themes/ next to its config first, so the tinct name resolves to the file this plugin writes. You can also pick "tinct" interactively via ghostty +list-themes or the in-app theme picker.

Reload behaviour

Automatic

After writing the file, the plugin broadcasts SIGUSR2 to every running ghostty process:

pkill -USR2 -x ghostty

Ghostty's signal handler re-reads its config and live-applies the new theme to every open window. No restart required.

On Windows the signal mechanism doesn't exist — the hook warns and skips it; the theme still loads on the next Ghostty start.

Manual fallback

If --ghostty.reload=false was passed, or ghostty isn't running yet:

pkill -USR2 -x ghostty

…or restart Ghostty (Cmd+Q / close all windows then re-launch).

Uninstall / revert

1. Remove the config line from your Ghostty config:

   Delete the theme = tinct line (or change it back to your previous theme).

2. Delete the generated file:

   rm ~/.config/ghostty/themes/tinct.conf

3. Reload to drop the theme:

   pkill -USR2 -x ghostty

4. External state: this plugin only writes to ~/.config/ghostty/themes/. No further cleanup is required.

Flags

Flag	Default	Description
--ghostty.output-dir	~/.config/ghostty/themes	Override the output directory
--ghostty.reload	true	Send SIGUSR2 to running ghostty processes after generation

Colour role mapping

Ghostty key	Tinct role
background	background
foreground	foreground
cursor-color	accent1
cursor-text	background
selection-background	accent1
selection-foreground	foreground
palette = 0..7	ANSI black..white
palette = 8..15	ANSI bright-black..bright-white

Customising the template

Extract the default template to override it:

tinct plugins templates dump -o ghostty -l ~/.config/tinct/templates/ghostty

This writes ~/.config/tinct/templates/ghostty/tinct.tmpl. Tinct uses your version in preference to the embedded default.

See the templating reference for the available functions and palette accessors.

Troubleshooting

theme = tinct errors with "theme not found"

Ghostty searches themes/ next to the config file it loaded. Confirm the path matches:

ghostty +show-config | grep -i theme
ls -l ~/.config/ghostty/themes/tinct.conf

If Ghostty is using a different config root (e.g. macOS Application Support), point the plugin at it with --ghostty.output-dir or set TINCT_PLUGIN_GHOSTTY_OUTPUT_DIR.

Theme loaded but colours look stale

Auto-reload only happens if Ghostty was running when tinct generate finished. Re-run pkill -USR2 -x ghostty by hand, or pass --ghostty.reload=true (the default).

pkill: command not found (Windows / minimal containers)

The signal broadcast is a no-op on Windows and exits silently if pkill is missing. The file is still written; restart Ghostty to load it.

Related plugins

• alacritty, kitty, wezterm — other GPU-accelerated terminals.
• tmux — pair the terminal palette with a matching multiplexer status bar.