How do I change the background color for the taskbar?

In an old thread this question was asked and the response labeled "partially solved". I disagree; the advice given (to go to "personalization" and turn "show color on Start, Task bar, action center and title bar" to "on" and pick a color) does not change the background color of the task bar, which remains black regardless of this setting. So I am asking the question again: how can you change the background color of the task bar from black to something that will actually contrast with the icons? Black is a terrible color; some of the icons are barely visible with that setting.

Yes, I agree that the color picker does change the color of the title bars for individual windows, but it does not change the color of the screen taskbar at top or side of the screen, at least if you have a custom desktop, e.g., you pick as a desktop background a unique image. The background color of the taskbar (at the top or side) should have nothing to do with the desktop background. So this solution does not address that issue.

Hello and welcome to TenForums! :)

There is another way you can play around with the colours using the old control panel

You can try this by creating a shortcut to the old control panel for colour and appearance.

Refer to the Note to see how the normal settings menu will influence this. Not sure if it will help you but it does seem to provide an alternative way to tweak and you can apply the mixer settings to tweak even further. I just tried it and I can definitely change the taskbar from black to another colour.

As you can see from the attachment: the big blue (sloppy) arrow points to the fact that the background of the taskbar is black. The two (sloppy) "v" pointers point to illustrative icons in the taskbar which are barely visible because of the fact that the background is black. How could no one at Microsoft think of this issue?

philc43 said:

Hello and welcome to TenForums! :)

There is another way you can play around with the colours using the old control panel

You can try this by creating a shortcut to the old control panel for colour and appearance.

Refer to the Note to see how the normal settings menu will influence this. Not sure if it will help you but it does seem to provide an alternative way to tweak and you can apply the mixer settings to tweak even further. I just tried it and I can definitely change the taskbar from black to another colour.

`````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````

Interesting, but I'm not seeing any information here on how to access the old control panel. The settings they show all seem to apply to the new (Windows 10) control panel, none of which affect the background color of the taskbar (at least in my experience--have even tried re-booting).

ProdMan said:

`````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````

Interesting, but I'm not seeing any information here on how to access the old control panel. The settings they show all seem to apply to the new (Windows 10) control panel, none of which affect the background color of the taskbar (at least in my experience--have even tried re-booting).

Why did you not try option 1 or 2 in the link I posted? That described the process to get the old control panel tool for colours. Even using the new system menu colour panel the changes are instant - no rebooting needed. This makes me suspicious that there is something else not quite right with your setup. What windows version are you on and how did you upgrade?