Reduce Applications Icon Size in GNOME Shell

Edit /usr/share/gnome-shell/theme/gnome-shell.css

...
/* Application Launchers and Grid */

.icon-grid {
  spacing: 36px;
  -shell-grid-horizontal-item-size: 118px;
  -shell-grid-vertical-item-size: 118px;
}

.icon-grid .overview-icon {
  icon-size: 96px;
}
...

to

...
/* Application Launchers and Grid */

.icon-grid {
  spacing: 18px;
  -shell-grid-horizontal-item-size: 96px;
  -shell-grid-vertical-item-size: 96px;
}

.icon-grid .overview-icon {
  icon-size: 48px;
}
...

Logout and log back in to see the change.

2 thoughts on “Reduce Applications Icon Size in GNOME Shell”

  1. Thanks Benoit, I’ll be checking out Ubuntu 14.04 this week. Good to know that the iconGrid.js has to be changed also.

  2. Helpful and clear, thanks for sharing.

    In my case (fresh install of ubuntu GNOME 14.04) this was efficient in re-dispatching the elements (containers) of the applications grid but did not change the icons size.

    I also had to edit the /usr/share/gnome-shell/js/ui/iconGrid.js file. Line 14 in this file now reads const ICON_SIZE = 48; instead of const ICON_SIZE = 96;

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