Color the Table in LaTeX Using xcolor Package, tabularray Package, and TikZ

Jan. 16, 2025

Color the table using xcolor package

Example 11:

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\documentclass[a4paper]{article}
\usepackage[table]{xcolor}
\pagestyle{empty}

\setlength{\arrayrulewidth}{0.5mm}
\setlength{\tabcolsep}{18pt}
\renewcommand{\arraystretch}{2.5}

\begin{document}
{\rowcolors{3}{green!80!yellow!50}{green!70!yellow!40}
\begin{tabular}{|p{3cm}|p{3cm}|p{3cm}|}
	\hline
	\multicolumn{3}{|c|}{Country List} \\
	\hline
	Country Name or Area Name & ISO ALPHA 2 Code & ISO ALPHA 3 \\
	\hline
	Afghanistan & AF & AFG \\
	Aland Islands & AX & ALA \\
	Albania & AL & ALB \\
	Algeria & DZ & DZA \\
	American Samoa & AS & ASM \\
	Andorra & AD & AND   \\
	Angola & AO & AGO \\ \hline
\end{tabular}}
\end{document}

image-20250117100914383

where1:

Notice the braces right before the command \rowcolors{3}{green!80!yellow!50}{green!70!yellow!40} and after the tabular environment. The command \rowcolors takes three parameters each passed inside braces:

  • the row to start,
  • the colour for odd rows and
  • the colour for even rows.

Example 21:

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\documentclass[a4paper]{article}
\usepackage[table]{xcolor}
\pagestyle{empty}

\setlength{\arrayrulewidth}{1mm}
\setlength{\tabcolsep}{18pt}
\renewcommand{\arraystretch}{2.5}
\newcolumntype{s}{>{\columncolor[HTML]{AAACED}} p{3cm}}
\arrayrulecolor[HTML]{DB5800}

\begin{document}
\begin{tabular}{|s|p{3cm}|p{3cm}|}
	\hline
	\rowcolor{lightgray} \multicolumn{3}{|c|}{Country List} \\
	\hline
	Country Name or Area Name & ISO ALPHA 2 Code & ISO ALPHA 3 \\
	\hline
	Afghanistan & AF & AFG \\
	\rowcolor{gray}
	Aland Islands & AX & ALA \\
	Albania   & AL & ALB \\
	Algeria  & DZ & DZA \\
	American Samoa & AS & ASM \\
	Andorra & AD & \cellcolor[HTML]{AA0044} AND \\
	Angola & AO & AGO \\ \hline
\end{tabular}
\end{document}

image-20250117100945712

where1:

Below is a description about how to change the colour of each element in the table:

  • Colour of the lines. The command \arrayrulecolor is used for this. In the example an HTML format is used, but other formats are available too.

  • Background colour of a cell. Use the command \cellcolor. You can either enter the name directly inside the braces (red, gray, green and so on) or pass a format parameter inside brackets (HTML in the example) and then set the desired colour inside the braces using the established format.

  • Background colour of a row. In this case \rowcolor will accomplish that. The same observations about colour selection mentioned in the two previous commands are valid for this one.

  • Background colour of a column. This one is a bit tricky, but the easiest way is to define a new column type. The command \newcolumntype{s}{>{\columncolor[HTML]{AAACED}} p{3cm}} define a column type called s whose alignment is p, the column width is 3cm and the colour is set with HTML format to AAACED. This new column type is used in the tabular environment.

Example 32:

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\documentclass[a4paper]{article}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\usepackage[table]{xcolor}
\pagestyle{empty}

\newcommand\x{\times}
\newcommand\y{\cellcolor{green!10}}

\begin{document}
\begin{equation*}\label{eq:appendrow}
\left(\begin{array}{cccc}
	\rowcolor{red!20}
	\x & \x & \x & \x \\
	0 & \x & \x & \x \\
	\rowcolor{blue!20}
	0 & 0 & \x & \x \\
	0 & 0 & 0 & \x \\
	\y a & b & \y c & d\\
	\end{array}\right)
\end{equation*}

\begin{equation*}
\left(\begin{array}{>{\columncolor{olive!20}}cc>{\columncolor{yellow!20}}cc}
	\x & \x & \x & \x \\
	0 & \x & \x & \x \\
	0 & 0 & \x & \x \\
	0 & 0 & 0 & \x \\
	a & b & c & d \\
\end{array}\right)
\end{equation*}
\end{document}

image-20250117210600564


Color the table using tabularray package

Example 13:

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\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\usepackage{xcolor}
\usepackage{tabularray}
\SetTblrInner{colsep=5pt,rowsep=1pt}
\newcommand\x{\times}

\begin{document}

\begin{equation*}\label{eq:appendrow}
\left(\begin{tblr}{
	colspec = {cccc},
	row{1} = {red9},
	row{3} = {blue9},
	cell{5}{1,3} = {green9},
}
	\x & \x & \x & \x \\
	0 & \x & \x & \x \\
	0 &  0 & \x & \x \\
	0 &  0 &  0 & \x \\
	a &  b &  c &  d \\
\end{tblr}\right)
\end{equation*}

\begin{equation*}
\left(\begin{tblr}{Q[c,olive9]cQ[c,yellow9]c}
	\x & \x & \x & \x \\
	0 & \x & \x & \x \\
	0 &  0 & \x & \x \\
	0 &  0 &  0 & \x \\
	a &  b &  c &  d \\
\end{tblr}\right)
\end{equation*}
\end{document}

image-20250117232915948


Color the table using TikZ

Example4:

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\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{amsmath}

\newcommand\x{\times}

% requires version 0.3 of the package
\usepackage[customcolors]{hf-tikz}

\tikzset{style green/.style={
		set fill color=green!50!lime!60,
		set border color=white,
	},
	style cyan/.style={
		set fill color=cyan!90!blue!60,
		set border color=white,
	},
	style orange/.style={
		set fill color=orange!80!red!60,
		set border color=white,
	},
	hor/.style={
		above left offset={-0.15,0.31},
		below right offset={0.15,-0.125},
		#1
	},
	ver/.style={
		above left offset={-0.1,0.3},
		below right offset={0.15,-0.15},
		#1
	}
}

\begin{document}

\begin{equation*}\label{eq:appendrow}
\left(\begin{array}{cccc}
	\x  & \x  & \x & \x \\
	0   & \tikzmarkin[hor=style orange]{el} \x  & \x\tikzmarkend{el} & \x \\
	0   & 0   & \x & \x \\
	0   & 0   & 0  & \x \\
	\tikzmarkin[hor=style green]{row} a  &  b  &  c &  d \tikzmarkend{row}\\
\end{array}\right)
\end{equation*}

\begin{equation*}\label{eq:appendcol}
\left(\begin{array}{cccc}
	\tikzmarkin[ver=style cyan]{col 1}\x  & \x  & \tikzmarkin[ver=style green]{col 2} \x & \x \\
	0   & \x  & \x & \x \\
	0   & 0   & \x & \x \\
	0   & 0   & 0  & \x \\
	a \tikzmarkend{col 1}  &  b  &  c  \tikzmarkend{col 2} &  d \\
\end{array}\right)
\end{equation*}

\end{document}

image-20250117231403912

Example 256:

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\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{tikz}
\usetikzlibrary{matrix,fit}
\usetikzlibrary{backgrounds}
\newcommand\x{\times}

\begin{document}
\hfill
\begin{tikzpicture}
\matrix[matrix of math nodes,
		row sep=.5ex,
		column sep=.5ex,
		left delimiter=(,right delimiter=),
		nodes={text width=.75em, text height=1.75ex, text depth=.5ex, align=center}
		](m) 
	{
		\x & \x & \x & \x \\
		0  & \x & \x & \x \\
		0  & 0  & \x & \x \\
		0  & 0  & 0  & \x \\
		1  & 1  & 1  & 1 \\
	};
\begin{scope}[on background layer]
	\node[fit=(m-2-1)(m-2-4), draw=green!30, fill=green!30, rounded corners] {};
	\node[fit=(m-1-3)(m-5-3), draw=green!30, fill=green!30, rounded corners] {};
	\node[fit=(m-2-3), fill=green] {};
\end{scope} 
\end{tikzpicture}
\hfill
\begin{tikzpicture}
\matrix[matrix of math nodes,
			nodes={rectangle, minimum size=1.2em, text depth=0.25ex,
			inner sep=0pt, outer sep=0pt,
			anchor=center},
		column sep=-0.5\pgflinewidth,
		row sep=-0.5\pgflinewidth,
		inner sep=0pt,
		left delimiter=(, right delimiter=),
		row 2 column 2/.append style={nodes={draw=cyan,fill=cyan}},
		](m)
	{
		a_1 & \x & a_3 \\
		a_4 & \x & a_6 \\
		a_7 & \x & a_9 \\
	};
\begin{scope}[on background layer]
	\filldraw[cyan!50, rounded corners] (m-2-1.north west) -- 
		(m-2-1.south west) -- (m-2-3.south east)-- (m-2-3.north east)-- cycle;
	\filldraw[cyan!50, rounded corners] (m-1-2.north west) -- 
		(m-3-2.south west) -- (m-3-2.south east)-- (m-1-2.north east)-- cycle;
\end{scope} 
\end{tikzpicture}
\vspace{3em}

\hfill
\begin{tikzpicture}
\matrix[matrix of math nodes,
		nodes={rectangle, %draw, very thin,
			minimum size=1.2em, text depth=0.25ex,
			inner sep=0pt, outer sep=0pt,
			fill opacity=0.5, text opacity=1,
			anchor=center},
		column sep=-0.5\pgflinewidth,
		row sep=-0.5\pgflinewidth,
		column 2/.append style = {nodes={fill=cyan!50}},
		row 2/.append style = {nodes={fill=cyan!50}},
		row 2 column 2/.append style={nodes={fill=cyan}},
		inner sep=0pt,
		left delimiter=(, right delimiter=),
		]
	{
		a_1 & \x & a_3 \\
		a_4 & \x & a_6 \\
		a_7 & \x & a_9 \\
	};
\end{tikzpicture}
\hfill
\begin{tikzpicture}
\matrix[matrix of math nodes,
		nodes={rectangle,
			minimum size=1.5em, text depth=0.25ex,
			inner sep=0pt, outer sep=0pt,
			anchor=center},
		row 2/.append style = {nodes={preaction={fill=cyan!30}}},
		column 2/.append style = {nodes={fill=red!60},fill opacity=0.5, text opacity=1},
		inner sep=0pt,
		left delimiter=(, right delimiter=),
		]
	{
		a_1 & \x & a_3 \\
		a_4 & \x & a_6 \\
		a_7 & \x & a_9 \\
	};
\end{tikzpicture}
\hfill
\end{document}

image-20250117231453897


References

  1. Tables: Colour alternating rows. ˄ ˄2 ˄3 ˄4

  2. https://tex.stackexchange.com/a/69714/306224. ˄

  3. https://tex.stackexchange.com/a/614559/306224. ˄

  4. https://tex.stackexchange.com/a/69770/306224. ˄

  5. https://tex.stackexchange.com/a/415864/306224. ˄

  6. https://tex.stackexchange.com/a/415891/306224. ˄