Customization¶

Project documentation is as diverse as the projects themselves and Material for MkDocs is a great starting point for making it look beautiful. However, as you write your documentation, you may reach a point where small adjustments are necessary to preserve your brand's style.

Adding assets¶

MkDocs provides several ways to customize a theme. In order to make a few tweaks to Material for MkDocs, you can just add your stylesheets and JavaScript files to the docs directory.

Additional CSS¶

If you want to tweak some colors or change the spacing of certain elements, you can do this in a separate stylesheet. The easiest way is by creating a new stylesheet file in the docs directory:

.
├─ docs/
│  └─ stylesheets/
│     └─ extra.css
└─ mkdocs.yml

Then, add the following line to mkdocs.yml:

extra_css:
  - stylesheets/extra.css

Spin up the live preview server and start typing your changes in your additional stylesheet file – you should see them almost instantly after saving.

Additional JavaScript¶

The same is true for additional JavaScript. If you want to integrate another syntax highlighter or add some custom logic to your theme, create a new JavaScript file in the docs directory:

.
├─ docs/
│  └─ javascripts/
│     └─ extra.js
└─ mkdocs.yml

Then, add the following line to mkdocs.yml:

extra_javascript:
  - javascripts/extra.js

Further assistance can be found in the MkDocs documentation.

Extending the theme¶

If you want to alter the HTML source (e.g. add or remove some parts), you can extend the theme. MkDocs supports theme extension, an easy way to override parts of Material for MkDocs without forking from git. This ensures that you can update to the latest version more easily.

Setup and theme structure¶

Enable Material for MkDocs as usual in mkdocs.yml, and create a new folder for overrides which you then reference using the custom_dir key:

theme:
  name: material
  custom_dir: overrides

The structure in the overrides directory must mirror the directory structure of the original theme, as any file in the overrides directory will replace the file with the same name which is part of the original theme. Besides, further assets may also be put in the overrides directory.

The directory layout of the theme is as follows:

.
├─ .icons/                             # Bundled icon sets
├─ assets/
│  ├─ images/                          # Images and icons
│  ├─ javascripts/                     # JavaScript
│  └─ stylesheets/                     # Stylesheets
├─ partials/
│  ├─ integrations/                    # Third-party integrations
│  │  ├─ analytics.html                # - Google Analytics
│  │  └─ disqus.html                   # - Disqus
│  ├─ language/                        # Localized languages
│  ├─ footer.html                      # Footer bar
│  ├─ header.html                      # Header bar
│  ├─ language.html                    # Localized labels
│  ├─ logo.html                        # Logo in header and sidebar
│  ├─ nav.html                         # Main navigation
│  ├─ nav-item.html                    # Main navigation item
│  ├─ palette.html                     # Color palette
│  ├─ search.html                      # Search box
│  ├─ social.html                      # Social links
│  ├─ source.html                      # Repository information
│  ├─ source-date.html                 # Last updated date
│  ├─ source-link.html                 # Link to source file
│  ├─ tabs.html                        # Tabs navigation
│  ├─ tabs-item.html                   # Tabs navigation item
│  ├─ toc.html                         # Table of contents
│  └─ toc-item.html                    # Table of contents item
├─ 404.html                            # 404 error page
├─ base.html                           # Base template
└─ main.html                           # Default page

Overriding partials¶

In order to override a partial, we can replace it with a file of the same name and location in the overrides directory. For example, to replace the original footer.html, create a footer.html file in the overrides/partials directory:

.
├─ overrides/
│  └─ partials/
│     └─ footer.html
└─ mkdocs.yml

MkDocs will now use the new partial when rendering the theme. This can be done with any file.

Overriding blocks¶

Besides overriding partials, it's also possible to override (and extend) template blocks, which are defined inside the templates and wrap specific features. To override a block, create a main.html file inside the overrides directory:

.
├─ overrides/
│  └─ main.html
└─ mkdocs.yml

Then, e.g. to override the site title, add the following line to main.html:

{% extends "base.html" %}

{% block htmltitle %}
  <title>Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet</title>
{% endblock %}

Material for MkDocs provides the following template blocks:

For more on this topic refer to the MkDocs documentation.

Theme development¶

Material for MkDocs uses Webpack as a build tool to leverage modern web technologies like TypeScript and SASS. If you want to make more fundamental changes, it may be necessary to make the adjustments directly in the source of the theme and recompile it.

Environment setup¶

In order to start development on Material for MkDocs, a Node.js version of at least 12 is required. First, clone the repository:

git clone https://github.com/squidfunk/mkdocs-material

Next, all dependencies need to be installed, which is done with:

cd mkdocs-material
pip install -r requirements.txt
pip install mkdocs-minify-plugin
pip install mkdocs-redirects
npm install

Development mode¶

Start the Webpack watchdog with:

npm start

Then, in a second session, start the MkDocs server with:

mkdocs serve

Point your browser to localhost:8000 and you should see this documentation in front of you.

Building the theme¶

When you're finished making your changes, you can build the theme by invoking:

npm run build

This triggers the production-level compilation and minification of all stylesheets and JavaScript sources. When the command exits, the final files are located in the material directory. Add the theme_dir variable pointing to the aforementioned directory in the original mkdocs.yml.

Now you can run mkdocs build and you should see your documentation with your changes to the original theme.