Settings reference
A reference for the Settings menu. Open Settings from the launcher; the sections below mirror its top-level list. System tools that aren’t persistent settings - About, System Update, and a library rescan - live in the System menu (the Menu button), covered at the end.
Appearance
Section titled “Appearance”Theme and layout, under Settings → Appearance.

- Color Scheme - a curated palette picker: seven dark schemes and seven light ones, one of each per color of the spectrum, with Leaf (the soft-green default) leading. Each light scheme is the hue-twin of a dark one. Selecting one sets every color role at once.
- Colors - fine-tune individual color roles (accent, background, text, selection, hints, button label, button background) with a color picker. Editing any color switches the scheme to “Custom.”
- Layout - List Style (Rounded, Soft, Square, or the directional Leaf pill), Font family (Nunito by default, with eight more to choose from), Font Size, and Tab Switching (Glide for a sliding page transition, or Snap for an instant cut).
- Status Bar - toggle the Button Hints footer and each status indicator: Clock (with style options), Battery, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and Volume. With Button Hints off, content expands to fill the screen.
Display & Sound
Section titled “Display & Sound”- Brightness - screen backlight level.
- Output - audio routing: Speaker, Headphones, or a connected Bluetooth device.
- Volume - system volume (also adjustable with the hardware volume keys, which show an on-screen overlay).
Lighting
Section titled “Lighting”Control the RGB ring around the stick:
- Mode - solid, breathing, and rainbow, plus a few animated effects.
- Color, Brightness, and Speed.
A breathing-green glow is the default Leaf identity; the ring can also be toggled with a stick click.
Network
Section titled “Network”Wi-Fi management: scan for and join networks, see connection status, signal strength, and IP address, and turn the radio on or off. The on/off state persists across reboots. (Developers will also find an ADB-over-network toggle here.)
Bluetooth
Section titled “Bluetooth”Pair and connect headsets and controllers. Bluetooth is deliberately manual: press X to scan, then connect or pair the device you want - there’s no background scanning. Each entry shows a device-type icon (headset, controller, and so on) before its name.
- One audio device connects at a time; a game controller can stay connected alongside a headset.
- Game and system audio follows the connected headset automatically - no need to switch the output by hand. (You can still pick the output under Display & Sound → Output.)
- Reconnect a paired device from this page whenever you want it; Y unpairs it.
Game Art
Section titled “Game Art”How Leaf picks artwork when it downloads from ScreenScraper.fr (sign in first under Accounts). You start a scrape from a game or system’s Options menu, covered in Adding games → Options menu.
- Artwork Priority - the order Leaf prefers artwork types (box art, title screen, in-game shot, and so on). It saves the first type a game has available.
- Region Priority - the order Leaf prefers regions when a game has art for several. On each list, A includes or excludes an entry, and X grabs an entry so Up/Down reorders it.
Accounts
Section titled “Accounts”Sign-ins for external services. Press A on a row to enter your credentials with the on-screen keyboard; press Y to sign out. When a status line is too long to fit, it scrolls while the row is selected.
- RetroAchievements - signs RetroArch into retroachievements.org at every game launch, so achievements appear in supported cores. Use your account username, not your email address. If a launch happens to miss the sign-in (a Wi-Fi blip), the next one retries.
- ScreenScraper.fr - signs Leaf into screenscraper.fr so it can download artwork (see Game Art above, and Adding games → Box art). The row reads “Saved” until the first scrape verifies the login, then “Signed in as <user>” with your thread allowance and daily quota.
General
Section titled “General”- Startup Tab - which tab the launcher opens on.
- Auto Sleep - idle timeout before the device sleeps (can be turned off).
- Boot Splash - show or hide the Leaf boot animation.
- Game Performance - how hard the device works during gameplay: Auto, Balanced, Performance, or Battery Saver. See Features → Performance.
- Time Zone - set your local time zone so the clock is correct.
- Reset RetroArch Config - restore RetroArch to its defaults.
- Unmount Secondary SD - safely eject a second SD card before removing it.
System menu (Menu button)
Section titled “System menu (Menu button)”Press the Menu button to open the System menu - quick actions and system tools that sit apart from the persistent Settings:
- System Update - check for, download, and install updates over the air. See Updating (OTA).
- About - the installed Leaf version, system info (OS, kernel, hardware, and
network addresses), and the open-source components Leaf is built on, each with
its license. The full license text for every bundled emulator also ships inside
the install under
licenses/. - Rescan Library - re-index games and apps; the live game and app counts show beside the row.
- Return to Launcher, Sleep, Exit to Stock, Reboot, and Power Off - session and power actions.