Use UIManager to change the default icon for JTree
import javax.swing.Icon; import javax.swing.ImageIcon; import javax.swing.JFrame; import javax.swing.JScrollPane; import javax.swing.JTree; import javax.swing.UIManager; public class Main { public static void main(String[] argv) throws Exception { Icon leafIcon = new ImageIcon("leaf.gif"); Icon openIcon = new ImageIcon("open.gif"); Icon closedIcon = new ImageIcon("closed.gif"); UIManager.put("Tree.leafIcon", leafIcon); UIManager.put("Tree.openIcon", openIcon); UIManager.put("Tree.closedIcon", closedIcon); JTree tree = new JTree(); JFrame f = new JFrame(); f.add(new JScrollPane(tree)); f.setSize(300, 300); f.setVisible(true); } }