Why is Table of Content always with a grayed out background in writer?

I have a table of content and two chapters.
How do I get rid of the gray shaded background of the ToC? It looks as if ToC is selected.
I have tried to “Edit Table of Content” and set the backgorund to None. This does not change it. Very unexpected to me at least-
image

About Fields

it’s just a long standing convention to help in the editing process,
just like Formatting Marks

but it doesn’t impact the printed version,
which you can control on Print Preview

Ok - it is a convention which I am not accustomed to so I try to disable it.
In the help About Fields it says I can permanently disable this feature in settings in Tools - Options - LibreOffice - Application Colors, and clear the check box in front of Field shadings. But there does not appear such a setting - see screen copy here:

Also same place in help it suggets: To display or hide field highlighting in a document, choose View - Field Shadings.
This does not affect the ToC either.

What am i missing here?

This is the version info.
Version: 25.2.0.3 (X86_64) / LibreOffice Community
Build ID: e1cf4a87eb02d755bce1a01209907ea5ddc8f069
CPU threads: 20; OS: Windows 11 X86_64 (10.0 build 26100); UI render: default; VCL: win
Locale: en-US (en_DK); UI: en-GB
Calc: CL threaded

In version 25.2 the place where the shadow of some elements is activated /deactivatex, such as tabulators (what you see in gray in the TOC) and non -separation spaces.

  • Previously it was activated while the fields
  • Now it is activated with format marks.

You can choose what format marks to see in Tools > LibreOffice Writer > Formating Aids

And you can deactivate al marks in VIew > Formating Marks

Thanks,
I tried uncheck all ticks in the tools->options->LibreOffice Writer > Formating Aids followed by toc update - no change in ToC shading. It does toggle the formatting marks, but that is not the issue.
I am at rim of giving up on this, but thanks for all your help.

May be some customization of the index?.

  • Tray to delete de index an insert it again.

Deleted and recreated ToC - same thing - ToC remain gray.

Thanks, but I give up!

As you know , the grey doesn’t print or export but just assists the writer to know what are fields and layout and what is text.

.
25.2 has a new Appearance system and there are improvements in the pipeline.
Most important, do not try to alter the Automatic theme at the moment, it would require a a profile reset to fix.
You can remove the grey as follows

  1. Click Tools > Options > LibreOffice > Appearance and choose a new LibreOffice Theme from the icon with tooltip Add more themes. Allow LibreOffice to restart
  2. Click Tools > Options > LibreOffice > Appearance then select Writer Index and table shadings. Untick the box Show in Document. OK
  3. You will see the the words and numbers with a white background but the tabs will still have a grey background.
    GreyTabs
    To hide the grey for the tabs
    1. Either unselect View > Formatting marks. Or
    2. Click Tools > Options > LibreOffice Writer > Formatting Aids and under Display Formatting untick Tabs

After this you will have removed some very useful clues as to what you have in your document so you will have to have your wits about you when editing.

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