Changing your ZSH Prompt in 60 Seconds

If you're using a newish version of Mac, or Kali Linux then chances are your terminal uses zsh shell by default. But most of this article applies for users of bash shells too.

You might have noticed that the default prompt in these terminals looks something like this:

yourname@yourcomputer currentdirectory %

There are good reasons why that's the default - since it changes if you ssh into another machine, it's each to see at a glance which user and machine you're logged in to.

And that default is fine if you're got a short name and a short computer name, but not so great if you're got a long name or made the mistake of naming your computer in a creative way.

But there's no need to stay with the default prompt; it's super easy to change it to pretty much anything you want.

The left prompt is defined in a variable called PROMPT (or PS1), and the right prompt is defined in a variable called RPROMPT

So all you have to do is export PROMPT or RPROMPT with a new string, and if you want to permanently use that as your new default then you should also add it to your .zshrc file.

Here's a video showing how quick it is to change your prompt. Scroll down for the commands you can copy into your terminal.

Default prompt:

export PROMPT="%n@%m %1~ %# "

Replacing username and server:

export PROMPT="working@Home %1~ %# "

Adding some colour:

export PROMPT="%F{red}working%f@Home %1~ %# "

Adding more colour:

export PROMPT="%F{red}working%f@%F{green}Home%f:) %1~ %# "

Adding a smily:

export PROMPT="%F{red}working%f@%F{green}Home%f😊 %1~ %# "

Showing only 1 level of your current path:

export PROMPT="%1~ 😊 "

Showing 2 levels of your current path:

export PROMPT="%2~ 😊 "

Showing 3 levels of your current path:

export PROMPT="%3~ 😊 "

Adding the current time into the right of the terminal:

export RPROMPT="%T" 

Adding some emphasis and changing the colour:

export RPROMPT="%S%F{250}%T%f%s"

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The colour numbering convention is a bit weird. Here are the basic colours and greyscale colours. If you want a full list then just search for xterm color schemes

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