Desktop theme is a cool feature introduced with Windows 7. Plenty of third-party and as well official themes around for Windows OS. In fact, the official Windows personalization gallery has over 300 beautiful desktop themes for Windows 7, Windows 8 and Windows 10.
As you likely know, a desktop theme usually includes two or more pictures among other things. In Windows 8.1 and Windows 7, after installing and applying a desktop theme, we could choose individual wallpapers included in the current theme. That is, in older versions of Windows OS, selecting a single wallpaper from a theme was quite easy and straight-forward.
Microsoft has partially removed the classic Personalization window from Windows 10. While the Personalization window does present in Windows 10 as well, many of its features have been removed.
In Windows 10, choosing individual pictures included in a theme is quite difficult. For instance, if the currently active desktop theme includes 10 images but you like only 5 of them, there is no easy option to choose only those 5 pictures. In short, Windows 10 automatically uses all pictures for desktop background even if you’re interested only in a couple of pictures.
If you open the classic Personalization window and click on Desktop background link, the background section of Settings app opens up instead of the classic Choose your desktop background window. And yes, the classic Choose your desktop background does exist in Windows 10.
Use pictures that you like in a desktop theme in Windows 10
Users who would like to choose individual wallpapers offered in the current desktop theme can use the given below directions to choose only wallpapers that you would like to see as desktop background.
To install a new theme, please refer to our how to install and apply a new theme in Windows 10 guide.
Step 1: Simultaneously press Windows logo and R keys to open Run dialog box.
Step 2: In the Run command dialog, paste the following path and press Enter key to open Choose your desktop background window.
control /name Microsoft.Personalization /page pageWallpaper
Step 3: Choose pictures that you want to use as desktop background and then click Save changes button. That’s it! Windows 10 will now use only selected pictures for desktop background instead of using all pictures in the theme.
The other way is to extract all wallpapers from a theme pack file and then manually set a picture as desktop wallpaper or create a new theme out of it.
You might also want to know how to change a theme in Windows 10.
Summr says
Still not working. Anything that can be done about this? Microsoft obviously doesn’t want to address it and is making sure we cannot get static images from theme options. What is their deal?!
Adamastor says
Yep. Not working anymore (august 2017).
Brent B says
This method used to work, now it doesn’t. (7/2017) Microsoft did something again that hides the ability to change the pictures. It only gives me the ability to change folders, not individual pictures. The last picture in the article used to pull up, now it doesn’t. It is “Settings>Background” now.