Change how the editor looks

This page covers the ways you can make the editor comfortable to sit with for a long session: light or dark, the color of the room, a dark page to write on, and whether you see your words as the printed page or as one long column.

None of this changes your book. It's all about your screen.

Light, dark and the colors

Click the small half-filled circle in the toolbar to open Appearance.

Appearance—Auto follows your computer's own light or dark setting; Light and Dark stay put whatever your computer does.
Light theme—Ivory or Fall, the colors Write uses when it's light.
Dark theme—Plum or Slate, the colors it uses when it's dark.

You can pick a light theme and a dark theme both, and Auto will switch between them as your computer does.

Screenshot: the Appearance menu open in the editor, showing Appearance, Light theme, Dark theme, Layout and Dark page.

The same across Author Tools

Your appearance choices are shared with the other Author Tools apps you use. Set Dark and Slate here, and the help center and your account page will greet you the same way.

A dark page

The colors of the screen and the color of the page you write on are separate choices. Someone who likes a light screen but finds a white page glaring after a few hours can have both. Turn on Dark page—it's at the bottom of the Appearance menu, and in the Show menu too—and your page goes dark with light text.

Until you choose, the page follows the rest of the screen: dark when Write is dark. Once you flip it yourself, it stays the way you set it. Your book still prints on white paper, of course; Preview always shows the real thing.

Print format or full width

Layout (in the Appearance menu, and in its own Layout menu in the toolbar) chooses how your manuscript sits on the screen:

Print format—the page as it will print, at your trim size and in your book's type. Good for seeing how a chapter really falls.
Full width—one wide column of text, no pages. Good for drafting.

Your words are the same either way; switch as often as you like.

Zoom

In print format, the – and + beside the percentage in the toolbar make the page smaller or larger. Holding Alt while you scroll does the same. (Full width doesn't zoom; it fills the space you give it.)

Guides—faint lines marking the margins of the printed page. These only appear in print format.
Dark page—the same switch as above.
Codex names—underlines the names in your scene that have codex entries; point at one to see the entry. See The codex while you write.
Outline at the side—keeps the outline of your book open in a narrow column beside the page while you write. It shares that space with the review rail, so opening one closes the other. For the full outline, see Write, Outline and Preview.