Displaying NLCD landcover data in QGIS with landcover class type?

Question

I am trying to display land cover layer (.tif) into QGIS. But some reason the layer appears in grayscale when I load in QGIS (Figure 1). I am expecting to see the somewhat similar display as in ArcMap (Figure 2). In QGIS, when I looked into the layer's properties, the Singelband gray is a default Band rendering for this layer. I wonder how can I display the layer as in AcrMap or is there steps in QGIS to process the layer to look like in Figure 2.

I'm using QGIS 2.14.3-Essen OS: Windows 8

Figure 1

Figure 2

Answer 1

New user without the karma to comment on the above answer — but here's a Github Gist with a QGIS style / .qml file I made based on the above information (it looks like @StuSmith's link no longer works): https://gist.github.com/eidietrich/b069eeead2b542caa7c6d43d3eaf8699

Should be loadable via Layer Properties >> Symbology >> Style >> Load Style.

Answer 2

Here's how I enable color:

1. Drop-down Render Type to "Singleband pseudocolor"
2. Drop-down Color and select one of the color ramps.
3. Click the "Classify" button
4. Click "Apply"

But more importantly, you probably want to match the NLCD colors:

Here's what I did:

1. Download the NLCD data from: http://www.landfire.gov/bulk/downloadfile.php?TYPE=nlcd2011&FNAME=nlcd_2011_landcover_2011_edition_2014_10_10.zip
2. Unzip
3. Add the NLCD .img raster layer into QGIS. Here's what I get, which by default has the correct NLCD symbology:

If you would like to save the NLCD style for later use in QGIS, open the NLCD layer properties and click the Style tab. Again, here's what I get:

Click the Style dropdown and select "Save Style...". The saved .qml file can be used later on other projects requiring NLCD colors: click the Style dropdown and select "Load Style..", and select the previously saved.qml file. Voila! NLCD colors.