Create a portal theme

  • Release version: Australia
  • Updated March 12, 2026
  • 3 minutes to read
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    Summary of Create a portal theme

    ServiceNow allows customers to create custom portal themes for enhanced branding beyond the Branding Editor’s capabilities. This requires CSS knowledge and is managed through the Service Portal > Themes module. Themes control the look and feel of portals by associating CSS, headers, footers, and JavaScript resources with a portal.

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    Key Features

    • Theme Creation: Define a theme with a unique name, application scope, and toggle SCSS compilation. Themes link with headers and footers stored in the spheaderfooter table.
    • Fixed Header/Footer: Options to lock headers or footers to the viewport during scrolling for consistent navigation.
    • CSS Variables: Customize color and style using CSS custom properties within the theme. CSS variables should be defined in the CSS variables field, while CSS rules belong in CSS Includes.
    • CSS Includes: Attach internal style sheets (uploaded to the CSS table) or external CSS URLs. You can enable lazy loading to optimize page load times, though it’s not recommended for portals susceptible to unstyled content flashing.
    • Right-to-Left (RTL) Support: Include external RTL CSS files to support languages like Hebrew, ensuring proper layout mirroring.
    • JavaScript Includes: Add internal UI scripts or external JavaScript files to the theme to extend functionality across the portal.
    • Dark Theme Option: Enable the Coral dark theme variant to improve accessibility, focus, and readability.
    • Theme Variants: Create variants from the Coral theme using customizable CSS variables and branding to tailor user experience.

    Practical Use for ServiceNow Customers

    By creating custom portal themes, customers can fully control portal appearance and behavior to align with corporate branding and accessibility standards. Associating headers, footers, CSS, and JavaScript centrally with a theme simplifies consistent styling across all portal pages. Enabling features like fixed headers or dark themes enhances usability and engagement. Lazy loading CSS can improve performance but should be used carefully.

    This capability is ideal for customers who require advanced styling or integration beyond the Branding Editor’s limits and have CSS proficiency. It enables a scalable, maintainable, and customizable portal design approach that can evolve with organizational needs.

    If you need more customizations than the Branding Editor can provide, you can create your own custom theme.

    Only users with an understanding of CSS should create custom themes.

    1. Navigate to Service Portal > Themes, then select New.
    2. Complete the form fields and then from the form context menu, select Save.
      Table 1. Theme form fields
      Field Description
      Name Name of your theme. Use this name to associate the theme with your portal. This name isn't visible to users.
      Turn off SCSS compilation Turns off compiling SCSS and sends the plain CSS file directly to the client.
      Application

      The record scope. The header menu record and the source table must have the same application scope.

      Header List of headers and footers from the sp_header_footer table that you can associate with a portal theme. Headers and footers are widgets and can be configured the same way.
      Footer List of headers and footers from the sp_header_footer table that you can associate with a portal theme.
      Fixed header Locks the header at the top of the page so that when you scroll, the header remains on the screen.
      Fixed footer Locks the footer at the bottom of the page so that when you scroll, the footer remains on the screen.
      CSS variables CSS custom properties that you can use to change the color and styles in a portal. For example, the stock theme uses some of the following variables:
      $sp-logo-margin-x: 		15px !default;
      $sp-tagline-color:		$text-color !default;
      $navbar-inverse-bg: 	#3a3f51 !default;
      Note:
      Use the CSS variables field to define CSS variables only. Use CSS Includes to define CSS rules. As of the Madrid release, Sass and LESS can be used within CSS Includes.
    3. To add a style sheet to the theme, in the CSS Include related list, select New.
    4. Complete the style sheet form fields and select Submit.
      Table 2. Style sheet form fields
      Field Description
      Name Name of the CSS Include. Remember this name to associate the CSS Include with the theme.
      Application The record scope. The header menu record and the source table must have the same application scope.
      Source Select one of the following options:
      • Style Sheet: Add an internal style sheet that has been uploaded to the CSS table [sp_css]. For example, ng-sortable.min.css. Internal style sheets use standard CSS in the CSS field.
      • URL: Link to an external style sheet. Use external style sheets to use the same CSS as a corporate website or other online resource.
      Style sheet An internal style sheet to associate with the theme.
      CSS file URL A URL to an external style sheet to associate with the theme.
      Lazy Load

      Option to load the CSS Include asynchronously to improve page load time. This option should be set to the same value for all CSS Includes of a theme. Enabling asynchronous loading for only some CSS Includes associated with a theme isn’t recommended.

      Note:
      Enabling Lazy Load isn’t recommended for portals with flashing of unstyled content.

      The CSS Includes with Lazy Load enabled are listed in the Lazy load CSS includes related list in the theme record.

      RTL CSS file URL

      A URL to an external style sheet for mirroring the direction of a portal when the session language is a right-to-left language, such as Hebrew.

      For information about support for right-to-left languages, see Styling for right-to-left languages in portals.

    5. To add a JavaScript include to the theme, in the JS Include related list, select New.
    6. Complete the JS Include form fields and select Submit.
      Table 3. JS Include form fields
      Field Description
      Display name Name of the JS Include. Remember this name to associate the JS Include with the theme.
      Application The record scope. The header menu record and the source table must have the same application scope.
      Source Select one of the following options:
      • UI Script: Add an internal UI script that has been uploaded to the UI script table [sys_ui_script]. Use UI scripts to create client-side JavaScript and reuse it in multiple locations. For more information on UI scripts, see UI scripts.
      • URL: Link to an external JavaScript file. Use external URLs to use the same JavaScript as a corporate website or other online resource.
      UI Script or JS file URL Associate an internal UI script or JavaScript file URL, depending on which option you select in the Source field.
      Updated Date and time that the JS Include was last updated
      Package The Service Portal package that the JS include is associated with. For example, Service Portal Configuration Pages. This field is populated by default.