---
id: accessible-pygments
version: "0.0.5"
license: BSD-3-Clause
license_treatment: permissive
maintenance: active
---

# accessible-pygments — A collection of accessible pygments styles

License: permissive · Maintenance: active · Downloads: 5.4M/mo

## What it is and what it does

accessible-pygments is a theme package for Pygments that bundles multiple syntax highlighting color schemes designed to meet WCAG 2.1 accessibility standards. It provides themes at both AAA (highest contrast) and AA (standard contrast) compliance levels, with several variants optimized for color-blind users. The package integrates directly with Pygments' HtmlFormatter and works as a Sphinx documentation plugin, allowing developers to apply accessible color schemes to code blocks in documentation, websites, and applications without writing custom CSS or color definitions.

The package includes themes derived from established open-source projects like GitHub's VSCode themes, pitaya-smoothie, and others, all validated for color contrast ratios. It's designed for developers building documentation systems, technical blogs, or code-heavy applications who need to ensure their syntax highlighting meets accessibility standards without manual color tuning.

Use it for:

- Apply WCAG-compliant syntax highlighting to Sphinx documentation by setting pygments_style in conf.py.
- Highlight code snippets in web applications with guaranteed color contrast for users with low vision.
- Use color-blind friendly themes when building documentation or tools for diverse audiences.
- Replace default Pygments themes with accessible alternatives in existing code formatters.
- Ensure code examples in educational materials meet accessibility standards for all learners.

## Worth the install?

AI-flagged interpretation of the facts above — verify before relying.

Provides a collection of WCAG 2.1-compliant syntax highlighting themes for Pygments, including color-blind friendly variants for use in code documentation and applications.

Yes. If you use Pygments for code highlighting and need WCAG 2.1 compliance, this package eliminates the need to design and validate color schemes yourself. Low install friction, no known vulnerabilities, permissive license, and active maintenance make it a straightforward addition to documentation or web projects. Skip it only if you have custom color requirements or don't need accessibility compliance.

## Install

pip install accessible-pygments
uv add accessible-pygments
poetry add accessible-pygments

## Installing accessible-pygments

Before you install: Low friction install with a single runtime dependency on pygments. Actively maintained with recent commits; development status is Alpha but the package has been stable since its first release in 2022.

License in practice: BSD-3-Clause is permissive; you can use, modify, and distribute this package freely in both open-source and proprietary projects with minimal restrictions.

Quickstart:

pip install accessible-pygments

from pygments.formatters import HtmlFormatter
formatter = HtmlFormatter(style='a11y-light')
# Use formatter to highlight code with accessible theme

Requires pygments to be installed; Pygments handles the actual syntax highlighting.

Verify before relying:

- Whether all listed themes are fully tested for WCAG 2.1 compliance across all code language types.
- Performance characteristics when rendering large code blocks with these themes.

## Package facts

- License: BSD-3-Clause (permissive)
- Python support: supports_current
- Install friction: low
- Maintenance: active
- Downloads: 5.4M/month (top 5,000 on PyPI)
- Known vulnerabilities: none known

## Tags

accessible pygments themes, wcag compliant syntax highlighting, color-blind friendly code themes, sphinx documentation themes, accessible code highlighting, accessibility, wcag-compliance, syntax-highlighting

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