Fullscreen Terminal Windows In Lanterna

(Tags: Blog/Post, Computing/Programming_Language/Java, Computing/UI/TUI, Public) 
published: 2021-01-06
creationDate: 2021-01-06
modifiedDate: 2025-07-11

tldr: Here’s a code snippet of a fullscreen terminal window using Lanterna.

Lanterna is an easy way to make text only user interfaces in Java that I highly recommend. One thing that took me too long to find was how to make a window fullscreen. Add:


yourWindow.setHints(java.util.Collections.singleton(Window.Hint.FULL_SCREEN));

Here’s it in a minimal example:

import java.io.IOException;
import com.googlecode.lanterna.gui2.*;
import com.googlecode.lanterna.screen.*;
import com.googlecode.lanterna.terminal.*;

public class TUI {
  public static void main(String[] args) {
    MultiWindowTextGUI gui;
    Screen screen;
    BasicWindow window;

    try (Terminal terminal = new DefaultTerminalFactory().createTerminal()) {
      screen = new TerminalScreen(terminal);
      screen.startScreen();

      gui = new MultiWindowTextGUI(screen);
      window = new BasicWindow();
      window.setComponent(new Label("Hello, fullscreen!"));
      // Set window to use fullscreen hint
      window.setHints(java.util.Collections.singleton(Window.Hint.FULL_SCREEN));
      gui.addWindowAndWait(window);
    } catch (IOException ex) {
    }
  }
}

Note: There are other hints you can use in Window.Hint you can use. Put them in a collection and pass them to the setHints method. I like Window.Hint.NO_DECORATIONS.

Note: Note: As told in the documentation, “Please note that it’s up to the window manager if these hints will be honored or not.”

Resources