Enable or Disable High Contrast Message and Sound in Windows 10

How to Enable or Disable High Contrast Message and Sound in Windows 10

High Contrast Mode is a part of the Ease of Access system in Windows 10. It includes many options to improve the usability of the operating system, especially for users with various health issues.

Windows comes with a number of themes that provide high contrast mode.  They are useful when it is hard to read text on the screen because you need more color contrast. Also, high contrast mode can be enabled or disabled with a keyboard shortcut.

Windows 10 high contrast themes provide a different look for the OS. The following screenshot demonstrates one of them:

To quickly enable High Contrast, you can press the left Shift + left Alt + PrtScn keys. By pressing these keys a second time, you'll disable High Contrast.

When you use the left Shift + Alt + PrtScn keyboard shortcut to turn on or off High Contrast mode, a sound will play by default to let you know. Additionally, when you use the left Shift + Alt + PrtScn hotkey to turn on High Contrast, a warning message will appear to confirm the operation.

Enable or Disable High Contrast Warning Message and Sound in Control Panel

This post will show you how to enable or disable the warning message and sound for High Contrast in Windows 10.

To Enable or Disable High Contrast Message and Sound in Windows 10

1. Open the Classic Control Panel.
2. Click on Ease of Access.
3. In Ease of Access, click on the Ease of Access Center. 
4. Click on the link Make the computer easier to see.
5. Under High Contrast, check (enable) or uncheck (disable) Display a warning message when turning a setting on and Make a sound when turning a setting on or off according to your preferences, and click on the OK button.
6. You are done.

Note that the above options are not available when the Turn on or off High Contrast with left ALT + left SHIFT + PRINT SCREEN is pressed is unchecked (disabled).

Alternatively, you can apply a Registry tweak to enable or disable the above features.

Enable or Disable High Contrast Message and Sound in Registry

1. Open the Registry Editor app.
2. Go to the following Registry key. HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Accessibility\HighContrast. See how to go to a Registry key with one click.
3. On the right, modify or create a new string (REG_SZ) value Flags.
4. Set it to one of the following values.
   • 4198 = Disable warning message and sound
   • 4206 = Enable warning message and disable sound
   • 4214 = Disable warning message and enable sound
   • 4222 = Enable warning message and sound
5. To make the changes done by the Registry tweak take effect, you need to sign out and sign in to your user account, or Restart Windows 10.

To save your time, you can download and use the following *.REG files.

Download Registry Files

The undo tweak is included.

Thanks to Winreview.

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