picom

The shadow-exclude option can disable shadows for windows if required. For currently disabled windows, see .

To disable shadows for menus add the following to wintypes in picom.conf:

# menu        = { shadow = false; };
dropdown_menu = { shadow = false; };
popup_menu    = { shadow = false; };
utility       = { shadow = false; };

The other WINDOW_TYPE values that can be used are defined in the EWMH standard: , , , , menu, utility, , , , , , , , , and dnd.

To set opacity (in effect transparency) for focused and unfocused windows (for example terminal emulators), add the following to your picom.conf:

opacity-rule = [
  "90:class_g = 'URxvt' && focused",
  "60:class_g = 'URxvt' && !focused"
];

See also #Tabbed windows (shadows and transparency).

To disable shadows around Conky windows, have the following in ~/.conkyrc:

own_window_class conky

In the case this solution fail with blur effect, you can try this in ~/.conkyrc:

own_window_type= 'desktop'

dwm's statusbar is not detected by any of picom's functions to automatically exclude window manager elements. Neither dwm statusbar nor dmenu have a static window id. If you want to exclude it from inactive window transparency (or other), you will have to either patch a window class into the source code of each, or exclude by less precise attributes. The following example is with dwm's status on top, which allows a resolution independent of location exclusion:

$ picom <any other arguments> --focus-exclude "x = 0 && y = 0 && override_redirect = true"

Otherwise, where using a configuration file:

focus-exclude = "x = 0 && y = 0 && override_redirect = true";

The override redirect property seems to be false for most windows- having this in the exclusion rule prevents other windows drawn in the upper left corner from being excluded (for example, when dwm statusbar is hidden, x0 y0 will match whatever is in dwm's master stack).

See #Disable shadows for some windows.

To disable shadows for Firefox elements add the following to shadow-exclude in picom.conf:

"class_g = 'firefox' && argb",

See for more information.

Where inactive window transparency has been enabled (the argument when running as a command), this may provide troublesome results when also using slock. One solution is to amend the transparency to . For example, where running picom arguments as a command:

$ picom <any other arguments> -i 0.2

Otherwise, where using a configuration file:

inactive-dim = 0.2;

Alternatively, you may try to exclude slock by its window id, or by excluding all windows with no name.

Exclude all windows with no name from picom using the following options:

$ picom <other arguments> --focus-exclude "! name~=''"

Find your slock's window id by running the command:

$ xwininfo & slock

Quickly click anywhere on the screen (before slock exits), then type your password to unlock. You should see the window id in the output:

xwininfo: Window id: 0x1800001 (has no name)

Take the window id and exclude it from picom with:

$ picom <any other arguments> --focus-exclude 'id = 0x1800001'

Otherwise, where using a configuration file:

focus-exclude = "id = 0x1800001";

Applies to fully maximized windows (in sessions without any panels) with the default picom.conf caused and resolved by the following option:

unredir-if-possible = false;

See for more information.

If you observe screen tearing of video playback only in fullscreen, see #Flicker.

If you experience heavy lag when using Xft fonts in applications such as xterm or urxvt try:

--xrender-sync --xrender-sync-fence

or the xrender backend.

See for more information.

Try running picom with:

--backend xrender

or add

backend = "xrender";

to your picom.conf file.

See for more information.

When windows with transparency are tabbed, the underlying tabbed windows are still visible because of transparency. Each tabbed window also draws its own shadow resulting in multiple shadows.

Removing the multiple shadows issue can be done by adding the following to the already existing shadow-exclude list:

"_NET_WM_STATE@:32a *= '_NET_WM_STATE_HIDDEN'"

Not drawing underlying tabbed windows can be enabled by adding the following to your picom.conf:

opacity-rule = [
  "95:class_g = 'URxvt' && !_NET_WM_STATE@:32a",
  "0:_NET_WM_STATE@[0]:32a *= '_NET_WM_STATE_HIDDEN'",
  "0:_NET_WM_STATE@[1]:32a *= '_NET_WM_STATE_HIDDEN'",
  "0:_NET_WM_STATE@[2]:32a *= '_NET_WM_STATE_HIDDEN'",
  "0:_NET_WM_STATE@[3]:32a *= '_NET_WM_STATE_HIDDEN'",
  "0:_NET_WM_STATE@[4]:32a *= '_NET_WM_STATE_HIDDEN'"
];

Note that URxvt is the Xorg class name of your terminal. Change this if you use a different terminal. You can query a window's class by running the command and clicking the window.

See for more information.

Currently, picom is incompatible with 's option, a workaround is to use to set the background color:

$ hsetroot -solid '#000000'

See for more information.

Try this setting in picom.conf:

vsync = true;

See #Screen artifacts/screenshot issues when using AMD's Catalyst driver.

Another option to reduce lag with the glx backend is to disable "allow flipping" in nvidia settings (OpenGL section). This can also be done from the command line:

$ nvidia-settings -a 'AllowFlipping=0'

To load settings after reboot (see Autostarting) run

$ nvidia-settings --load-config-only

See #Screen artifacts/screenshot issues when using AMD's Catalyst driver.

When using a systemd service to trigger slock on a suspend or hibernate action, one may find the screen unlocked for a few seconds after resume. To prevent, disable window fading:

$ picom --no-fading-openclose

Many issues are regressions from the old compton, which picom is a fork of. As a last resort you can try compton-old-git^AUR and see if it helps.

A shadowed overlay on screen sharing and shadows of Zoom Meetings pop-up windows might be avoided by adding the following to shadow-exclude.

shadow-exclude = [
  "name = 'cpt_frame_xcb_window'",
  "class_g ?= 'zoom'",
];

Blurred screen sharing is disabled by adding Zoom Meetings to with

blur-background-exclude = [
  "class_g ?= 'zoom'",
];

For Microsoft Teams, the red border around the shared content is implemented with a mostly transparent window. Having blur enabled makes it impossible to work with and should be disabled as follows:

shadow-exclude = [
  "name = 'rect-overlay'",
];

blur-background-exclude = [
  "name = 'rect-overlay'",
];

Adding flag can disable the fade in and fade out effect when switching to a new workspace.