Radical Reborn

A maintained fork of Dan Hedgecock's Radical — a retro-futuristic dark theme — extended for VSCode and Zed.

Status: v0.1.0 — initial fork release.

What's different from upstream Radical

Zed support alongside VSCode, built from a single TypeScript palette + semantic-token core.
Modernized tooling: TypeScript 5, tsx, ESLint flat config, Node 22.
Coverage for newer editor surfaces: AI completion preview (ghost text), parameter annotations (inlay hints), sticky scroll subheader, semantic tokens, version-control decorations.
APCA contrast pass to verify body-text legibility.
MIT-licensed (upstream is ISC; Zed Extensions registry no longer accepts ISC).

Install

In every editor, pick Radical Reborn from the theme picker after install (VSCode/VSCodium/Cursor: Cmd/Ctrl-K Cmd/Ctrl-T).

After installing: the theme ships colors only — set up the recommended font (copy-paste settings included), and see Overrides to tweak any color without forking the theme.

VSCodium / Cursor / Windsurf (Open VSX)

Published to the Open VSX registry. Open the Extensions panel, search Radical Reborn, and install.

Stock Microsoft VSCode does not use Open VSX — install from the .vsix below.

VSCode (.vsix)

Download radical-reborn.vsix from the latest release and install:

code --install-extension radical-reborn.vsix

Or in VSCode: Extensions panel → ⋯ menu → Install from VSIX….

Zed

Install via the Zed Extensions panel: search Radical Reborn.

Registry submission under review (zed-industries/extensions#7072). Until it lands: clone this repo, npm install && npm run build, then run zed: install dev extension and pick the repo folder.

Build from source (contributors)

git clone https://github.com/AquaOctet/radical-reborn
cd radical-reborn
npm install
npm run build      # emits dist/RadicalReborn.json + themes/radical-reborn.json
npm run package    # produces radical-reborn.vsix
code --install-extension radical-reborn.vsix

Recommended font

Radical Reborn is a color theme — by design, neither VSCode nor Zed lets a theme bundle or force a font, so the font is yours to choose. We recommend Fira Code — a free, hugely popular coding font whose programming ligatures (=>, !=, >=) look great against this palette's pink operators. JetBrains Mono, Cascadia Code, and MonoLisa are excellent alternatives. Because the theme leans on italics (comments, type names, parameters), prefer a font with a real italic rather than a synthetic one.

VSCode — settings.json:

{
  "editor.fontFamily": "'Fira Code', 'JetBrains Mono', monospace",
  "editor.fontLigatures": true,
  "editor.fontSize": 14,
  "editor.lineHeight": 1.6
}

Zed — settings.json:

{
  "buffer_font_family": "Fira Code",
  "buffer_font_features": { "calt": true },
  "buffer_font_size": 14,
  "buffer_font_weight": 500,
  "buffer_line_height": "comfortable",
  "ui_font_size": 15
}

Copy-paste version: examples/zed-settings.jsonc.

Install Fira Code first (brew install --cask font-fira-code on macOS, your package manager on Linux, or the release zip). calt in Zed and fontLigatures in VSCode enable the ligatures.

Crisp rendering on a non-Retina display (macOS)

macOS uses grayscale antialiasing that's sharp on Retina but renders soft / fuzzy on low-DPI external monitors (1080p/1440p). This is an OS rendering behavior, not the theme. Fixes, most impactful first:

Reduce macOS font-smoothing — the big lever. In Terminal:
```
# Per-app, Zed only (recommended):
defaults write dev.zed.Zed AppleFontSmoothing -int 0
# …or globally, for every app:
defaults write -g AppleFontSmoothing -int 0
```
Fully quit and reopen Zed (the global form needs a logout/login). 0 disables the stroke "fattening" that blurs text at low DPI; try 1 if 0 looks too thin. Revert with defaults delete dev.zed.Zed AppleFontSmoothing. (For VSCode, the same trick uses bundle id com.microsoft.VSCode, or set "workbench.fontAliasing": "antialiased".)
Use a medium font weight (already in the snippet above) — thicker strokes catch more pixels and read crisper: "buffer_font_weight": 500.
Keep an integer font size (14, 15, 16 — not 14.5) and avoid fractional display scaling; both blur text at low DPI.

Fira Code's Regular weight is on the light side — if it still feels soft after the above, JetBrains Mono renders noticeably crisper at low DPI.

Is the font actually applied? (Zed)

A theme cannot set the font in Zed — Zed's theme format has no font field, so Radical Reborn ships colors only. The font comes entirely from your settings.json. Picking "Radical Reborn" in the theme picker changes colors, never the font. If Fira Code doesn't seem active, check these in order:

Is Fira Code installed? Zed only uses installed system fonts (it doesn't bundle any). On macOS:
```
system_profiler SPFontsDataType | grep -i "fira code" || echo "NOT INSTALLED"
```
If missing: brew install --cask font-fira-code, then fully quit and relaunch Zed (fonts load at startup).
Is the setting present? Open settings (cmd-, → ~/.config/zed/settings.json) and confirm a top-level key — not inside the theme block:
```
"buffer_font_family": "Fira Code"
```
The family name must match exactly: Fira Code (not FiraCode, and Nerd Font builds register as FiraCode Nerd Font).
Visual proof: with "buffer_font_features": { "calt": true }, type =>, !=, ->. Fira Code renders these as ligature glyphs. If they stay as separate characters, Fira Code isn't the active font.
Still wrong? Check Zed's log for a fallback:
```
tail -n 200 ~/Library/Logs/Zed/Zed.log | grep -i font
```
A "font not found / falling back" line means the name doesn't match an installed family — Zed quietly substitutes its default (Zed Plex Mono).

Overrides

Both editors let you layer your own colors on top of Radical Reborn in settings.json — no fork needed, and your tweaks survive theme updates.

Zed — experimental.theme_overrides applies to whatever theme is active. UI keys use the theme's style names; syntax colors nest under "syntax":

{
  "experimental.theme_overrides": {
    "editor.active_line.background": "#cd8ce720",
    "syntax": {
      "comment": { "color": "#7c9c9e", "font_style": null }
    }
  }
}

VSCode / VSCodium — scope overrides to the theme with a [Radical Reborn] block. Workbench (UI) keys and syntax tokens use separate settings:

{
  "workbench.colorCustomizations": {
    "[Radical Reborn]": {
      "editor.lineHighlightBackground": "#d043cf20"
    }
  },
  "editor.tokenColorCustomizations": {
    "[Radical Reborn]": {
      "comments": "#7c9c9e"
    }
  }
}

Key references: Zed theme keys (plus schemas/zed-v0.2.0-extended.json in this repo for newer engine keys) · VSCode theme color reference.

Acknowledgements

Original "Radical" theme by Dan Hedgecock. This fork preserves the palette philosophy (pink/teal/lavender/chartreuse on a deep purple-black) while extending coverage to modern editor surfaces and porting to Zed.

License

MIT — see LICENSE. Copyright Dan Hedgecock (2018, original) and Aqua (2026, fork).