In vim, change color of splits without the cursor

Question

How do I modify my custom colorscheme to make splits which do have the cursor change to a different color (I want to change the splits other than the one I am currently editing to be a muted gray rather than the same color as the split I am currently editing).

Answer 1

Vim uses the Normal highlight group for all window backgrounds. The only distinction for active vs. other windows is the StatusLine vs. StatusLineNC highlighting of the status line (i.e. the line below each window that separates the splits). That's all that Vim offers.

With a distinctive cursor, that should be enough to easily recognize the active window. Also, fading other windows is often counter-productive, because that makes it harder to refer to text displayed in them.