Fixing the cursor theme in Tor Browser on Linux Mint

My Tor Browser installation is unusual. Rather than install it from my distribution’s repos, I grab the tar.xz file from torproject.org/download/, extract it and run it directly from there. I do the same with Firefox and Thunderbird, but that’s likely a story for another day.

The system-wide cursor theme on Linux Mint is Bibata-Modern-Classic. It is ugly, super ugly. In fact, the very first thing I do when installing a new Mint version is to switch my cursor theme to DMZ Black. Every application respects my choice with the exception of Tor Browser. Instead, Tor Browser insists on using Bibata-Modern-Classic, the default Mint cursor. The usual fixes (checking permissions, verifying dconf settings, launching with environment variables) does nothing, perhaps because Tor is not properly integrated into my system per se, I dunno.

The solution that worked for me turned out to be two simple steps.

1: Update the GTK Settings File for Tor Browser

Tor Browser looks for GTK configuration in its own profile directory. A settings.ini file needs to be there.

Navigate to the Tor Browser directory .config directory. Mine is located in my home folder:

cd ~/tor-browser_en-US/Browser/.config/gtk-3.0

Edit the settings file:

nano settings.ini

Add these lines:

[Settings]
gtk-cursor-theme-name=DMZ-Black

There is usually already a [Settings] block present, so that gtk line can safely fit in at the bottom of that.

Save and exit.

2: Enable Legacy Cursors in Tor Browser’s Configuration

This step turned out to be the crucial one.

1. Open Tor Browser
2. Type about:config in the address bar and press Enter
3. Accept the warning prompt
4. Search for widget.gtk.legacy-cursors.enabled
5. Double-click it to set the value to true

After completing both steps, a full restart of Tor Browser resulted in the DMZ Black cursor theme appearing correctly.

It works on my machine.