Brief: This quick tutorial for beginners shows how to install and change icon themes in Linux Mint.
If you think the default Mint themes and icons are not good enough for you, why not change it? In this quick tip for beginners, we shall see how to install icon themes in Linux Mint 18 and more than that how to change the icons in Linux Mint. We shall see this quick tutorial by installing gorgeous Paper icon theme.
Just a quick note, if you do not know it already, there is a difference between ‘themes’ and ‘icon themes’. An icon theme just changes the look of icons while a theme changes a lot of other things along with the looks of icons.
Install icon themes in Linux Mint 18:
There are two ways to install icon themes in Linux Mint (and many other Linux distributions, if not all). If you download the icon theme in a zipped folder, you can extract it in ~/.icons directory. Usually, this directory does not exist. Feel free to create it.
The second way to install an icon theme is using a PPA. Most of the standard and popular icon themes have their own PPA. Lets see how to install Moka icons set in Mint using PPA.
Install Paper icon set in Linux Mint 18:
Open a terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and use the following commands:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:snwh/pulp
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install paper-icon-themeChange icons in Linux Mint 18:
Changing an icon theme in Ubuntu was straight forward. It is slightly hidden in Linux Mint though. Once you have installed the icon themes, go to Settings from the Menu. And then go to Themes.
Now you might have realized why I said that changing the icon is slightly hidden in Linux Mint. It is inside Themes option. To change only the icon, click on Icons there.
You’ll see all the icons set available here. Choose the one you like.
The changes will be reflected immediately. No need of a restart. Here is how my Linux Mint desktop looks after applying Moka icon themes:
I hope you find this quick to install and change icon themes in Linux Mint helpful. Don’t forget to check the best icon themes in Ubuntu, you’ll find some beautiful icons there to make your desktop prettier. Any questions, suggestion, thoughts? Feel free to drop a comment.
