Understanding themes

What it is

A theme is a named set of visual settings — logo, colors, button text, border radius, and on/off toggles — that controls what candidates see when they open a form or task in Onboarded. Every onboarding session runs inside a theme. If you haven't set one up, Onboarded falls back to a neutral default (Save & Next button text, dark header).

Themes have independent Light and Dark mode variants. Candidates see the variant that matches their device's OS preference.

Why it matters

Themes matter most when your account serves multiple employer brands. Take a staffing account that places workers under two different brand names — each employer can carry its own logo and colors, so candidates see the right brand regardless of which link they came through.

It's also useful for any account that wants its own branding on the forms: your logo and colors reinforce trust during the onboarding process.

How it works

The theme cascade

Every onboarding session resolves its theme in this order, stopping at the first level that has a value:

1. Per-link override — set when generating a signed onboarding link via Create Link on an employee record, or via the Create Onboarding Link automation action. Overrides everything below it.

2. Employer's active theme — assigned to the employer record. Applies to all sessions for that employer unless a per-link override is set.

3. Account's active theme — the account-level default, set in Account Settings → Edit Account.

4. Onboarded's built-in defaults — neutral styling if no theme is set at any level.

What a theme controls

Themes are organized into five setting groups, each configured independently for light and dark mode:

Light and dark modes

Each theme has independent light and dark configurations. You set them separately on the Light Theme and Dark Theme tabs in the theme editor. If you only configure one mode, the other falls back to Onboarded's built-in defaults — it won't inherit from the mode you did configure.

Themes and onboarding links

There are two kinds of links in Onboarded, and they interact with themes differently:

Registration links (persistent URLs in Account Settings → Registration Links) don't have a per-link theme setting. Their theme comes from the employer the link is associated with — or the account default if no employer is set. Changing an employer's active theme affects all that employer's registration links immediately.

Generated onboarding links (one-off signed URLs created via Create Link on an employee record, or via the Create Onboarding Link automation action) can carry a per-link theme override. When you generate the link you can choose a theme that applies to that link only, regardless of what the employer or account default is set to.

Example

Take an account that places workers under two employer brands: Acme Staffing (blue and white) and Peak Solutions (green and gray). The HR Engineer creates two themes — one per brand — and assigns the Acme theme to the Acme employer record and the Peak theme to the Peak employer record. Registration links for each employer automatically show the right branding.

Now say a recruiter needs to send a one-off onboarding link to a candidate for a special project that uses neither brand — they can select a third theme when generating the link, and that candidate sees the override theme without affecting any other candidates or the employer records.

If the account adds a third employer with no theme assigned, those candidates fall through to the account-level default — so setting a sensible account default is worth doing even if most employers have their own theme.

Read next

• 📄 How do I build a theme?