# Styling the sidebar without using CSS?

**URL:** https://meta.discourse.org/t/styling-the-sidebar-without-using-css/279050
**Category:** Support
**Created:** [September 14, 2023, 7:04pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/styling-the-sidebar-without-using-css/279050 "2023-09-14T19:04:09Z")
**Posts on this page:** 1
**Showing post:** 5

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### Author: ![Canapin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/meta/user_avatar/meta.discourse.org/canapin/32/119591_2.png) [@Canapin](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Canapin)
#### Post date: [September 20, 2023, 5:03pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/styling-the-sidebar-without-using-css/279050/5 "2023-09-20T17:03:37Z")

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> [@MarximusMG](#):
>
> I’m also curious to know if there’s any way to replace the bullet visual style for the category badges with emojis?

Hi!

This is possible with this theme component:

> [@Twemoji Icons](https://meta.discourse.org/t/twemoji-icons/272295):
>
> information_sourceSummary Use Twitter emojis as icons in Discourse.hammer_and_wrenchRepository [GitHub - nolosb/discourse-twemoji-icons: Use twemojis as icons in Discourse. · GitHub](https://github.com/nolosb/discourse-twemoji-icons.git)questionInstall Guide [How to install a theme or theme component](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-do-i-install-a-theme-or-theme-component/63682)open_bookNew to Discourse Themes? [Beginner’s guide to using Discourse Themes](https://meta.discourse.org/t/beginners-guide-to-using-discourse-themes/91966) Install this theme component The component adds Twitter emojis as icons. You can use emojis to add category and tag icons using the respecti…

🙂

Note that it’s not quite optimized (see the replies) and can only use Twitter’s emojis.

As an alternative, there’s this:

> [@Category Icons](https://meta.discourse.org/t/category-icons/104683):
>
> warning This theme component is deprecated and should no longer be used. Its features are now in Discourse Core (see: [Bringing popular features to Discourse](https://meta.discourse.org/t/bringing-popular-features-to-discourse-header-search-welcome-banner-and-category-icons-emoji/359169)). For private category icon customization, refer to [this topic](https://meta.discourse.org/t/new-aliases-for-replacing-lock-icons-on-closed-topics-and-restricted-categories/373778). discourse2Summary Category Icons allows category badge links to have icons next to the category name.eyeglassesPreview [Preview on Discourse Theme Creator](https://discourse.theme-creator.io/theme/Discourse/category-icons)hammer_and_wrenchRepository Link [https://github.com/discourse/discourse-category-icons](https://github.com/discourse/discourse-category-icons) …

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