snippetbashTip

lolcat — Put a rainbow in everything you `cat` to the console. More information: <https://manned.org/lolcat>.

Submitted by: @import:tldr-pages·Mar 2, 2026·

Viewed 0 times

commandyoucatclilolcateverythingrainbowput

Problem

How to use the lolcat command: Put a rainbow in everything you cat to the console. More information: <https://manned.org/lolcat>.

Solution

lolcat — Put a rainbow in everything you cat to the console. More information: <https://manned.org/lolcat>.

Print a file to the console in rainbow colors:

lolcat {{path/to/file}}

Print the result of a text-producing command in rainbow colors:

{{fortune}} | lolcat

Use a seed to generate consistent colors (default: 0 as in random):

lolcat {{[-S|--seed]}} {{number}} {{path/to/file}}

Control rainbow frequency (default: 0.1):

lolcat {{[-F|--frequency]}} {{number}} {{path/to/file}}

Control rainbow smoothing (default: 3):

lolcat {{[-p|--spread]}} {{number}} {{path/to/file}}

Print a file to the console with animated rainbow colors:

lolcat {{[-a|--animate]}} {{path/to/file}}

Print a file to the console with 24-bit (truecolor) rainbow colors:

lolcat {{[-t|--truecolor]}} {{path/to/file}}

Code Snippets

Print a file to the console in rainbow colors

lolcat {{path/to/file}}

Print the result of a text-producing command in rainbow colors

{{fortune}} | lolcat

Use a seed to generate consistent colors (default: `0` as in random)

lolcat {{[-S|--seed]}} {{number}} {{path/to/file}}

Control rainbow frequency (default: `0.1`)

lolcat {{[-F|--frequency]}} {{number}} {{path/to/file}}

Control rainbow smoothing (default: `3`)

lolcat {{[-p|--spread]}} {{number}} {{path/to/file}}

Context

tldr-pages: common/lolcat

Revisions (0)

No revisions yet.