How to change text or background color in a Windows console application

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You can change the colors for a console application using Win32 and here’s an example on how to:

#include "stdafx.h"
#include <Windows.h>
#include <iostream>

using namespace std; 

int main(void) 
{ 
    HANDLE hStdout = GetStdHandle(STD_OUTPUT_HANDLE); 
    if (hStdout == INVALID_HANDLE_VALUE) 
    {
        cout << "Error while getting input handle" << endl;
        return EXIT_FAILURE;
    }
    //sets the color to intense red on blue background
    SetConsoleTextAttribute(hStdout, FOREGROUND_RED | BACKGROUND_BLUE | FOREGROUND_INTENSITY);

    cout << "This is intense red text on blue background" << endl;
    //reverting back to the normal color
    SetConsoleTextAttribute(hStdout, FOREGROUND_RED | FOREGROUND_GREEN | FOREGROUND_BLUE);

    return EXIT_SUCCESS;
}

Look at the MSDN documentation for the SetConsoleTextAttribute function and Console Screen Buffers for more information.

A more complete example on console applications using Win32 is available here.

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