How to echo with different colors in the Windows command line

Question

I know that the color bf command sets the colors of the whole command line window but I wanted to to print one single line in a different color.

Answer 1

This isn't a great answer, but if you know the target workstation has Powershell you can do something like this (assuming BAT / CMD script):

CALL:ECHORED "Print me in red!"

:ECHORED
%Windir%\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\Powershell.exe write-host -foregroundcolor Red %1
goto:eof

---

Edit: _{^{(now simpler!)}}

It's an old answer but I figured I'd clarify & simplify a bit

PowerShell is now included in all versions of Windows since 7. Therefore the syntax for this answer can be shortened to a simpler form:

• the path doesn't need to be specified since it should be in the environment variable already.
• unambiguous commands can be abbreviated. For example you can:
  • use -fore instead of -foregroundcolor
  • use -back instead of -backgroundcolor
• the command can also basically be used 'inline' in place of echo
  (rather than creating a separate batch file as above).

---

Example:

powershell write-host -fore Cyan This is Cyan text
powershell write-host -back Red This is Red background

---

More Information:

The complete list of colors and more information is available in the
- PowerShell Documentation for Write-Host