Home windows can lastly auto-switch mild and darkish modes with this free app

This week, there’s a number of consideration being shined on Home windows 10, Home windows 11, and the variations between them. However one factor you ought to be utilizing on each working programs is PowerToys, Microsoft’s free goodie bag of expanded options for superior customers. The newest model of the app contains one thing the OS actually ought to do by itself already: automated mild/darkish mode switching.

The brand new Gentle Change (good identify) module is the headline characteristic of PowerToys 0.95, accessible as a direct obtain proper now, no beta required—and it’s a fairly nice implementation of this concept. Not solely are you able to set a schedule for darkish/mild modes primarily based on a selected time (or sundown to dawn), you possibly can even offset it or tie it to a selected location for sundown time. And similar to Home windows itself, you possibly can select if lighting modes apply to the complete interface, particular apps, or each.

Right here’s my favourite half as a shortcut junkie: You may apply a “theme toggle shortcut” to manually swap between mild and darkish modes at any time. Good! By default, that is Home windows key + Ctrl + Shift + D.

To make use of the brand new Gentle Change characteristic—and a bunch of different smaller enhancements to the opposite capabilities in PowerToys—launch the app and verify for an replace, or obtain it from the Microsoft Retailer or GitHub in case you don’t have it already.