Theming

The Orbital Shadcn UI Kit brings a complete theming system that mirrors how real-world Tailwind and Shadcn projects handle design tokens. Every color, shadow, and accent adapts dynamically through variable modes — letting you preview, customize, and export your themes without touching a single layer or style manually. The theming system is fully connected to the Orbital Variable Editor, allowing you to see changes in real time and export updated JSON files that sync perfectly with your Figma environment.

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How Theming Works

At its core, the theming engine combines Theme, Mode, and Tailwind CSS collections to define visual context across the system. You can customize primary colors, adjust neutral ranges, and refine elevation or shadow depth, all while maintaining consistency across both light and dark environments. Each component automatically inherits its color logic through these connected variables — meaning typography, buttons, cards, and dashboards all update at once when the theme changes.

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Dual Theme Modes

The kit includes fully configured Light and Dark modes. Each mode contains its own set of values under the Theme and Mode collections: Switching between modes instantly updates all UI components to reflect the selected state — including nested elements and marketing components.

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Tailwind-Driven Palettes

The entire theming structure is Tailwind-compliant. Each palette is built using the same naming conventions and scales (50 → 950) to ensure seamless translation between design and development. Tailwind color variables (e.g., slate, emerald, violet) can be directly referenced or overridden to create new brand color systems. This approach makes your Figma file production-ready and developer-friendly by default.

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Customization

You can adjust any theme property directly from the Orbital Variable Editor:

• Update base colors or neutral tones.
• Customize shadow strength or opacity.
• Define custom accent hues for data visualization (chart) or navigation (sidebar).

Once you’re done, export the JSON configuration and sync it back into Figma to update the entire kit instantly.

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Best Practices

• 🌗 Always test both Light and Dark modes before export to ensure balanced contrast and accessibility.
• 🎯 Use Tailwind naming conventions when introducing new variables for future scalability.
• 🧠 Keep color logic consistent across collections — avoid hardcoding values inside components.
• 💾 Save theme presets via the Variable Editor to reuse across multiple projects or brands.

Tip: Think of your theme as a live system, not a static palette. Every variable is a token that ensures your UI behaves like real code — predictable, scalable, and always in sync.

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Next Up

Continue to the Typography page → Learn how to structure text styles, font scales, and weights aligned with Tailwind and Shadcn conventions.