Complementary
Two colors from opposite sides of the wheel. They make each other look more vivid, which is why the pairing is used for anything that needs to stand out.
Cyan screen
A cyan screen is a display filled edge to edge with cyan, produced by lighting the green and blue subpixels with no red. It is used as a cool accent light, for underwater and moonlight effects in photography, and to test the green and blue channels together.
Quick colors, then fill the screen
Or a gradient
Or let it move
#00D9F5rgb(0, 217, 245) · hsl(187, 100%, 48%)
- Cool accent and rim lighting
- Moonlight and underwater effects
- Testing green and blue channels together
- Contrast partner for warm lighting
Cyan color codes
Every value for #00D9F5, ready to paste. Click any code to copy it.
| Channel | Decimal | Share | Hex | Octal | Binary |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Red | 0 | 0% | 00 | 0 | 00000000 |
| Green | 217 | 85.1% | D9 | 331 | 11011001 |
| Blue | 245 | 96.08% | F5 | 365 | 11110101 |
The nearest web-safe color is #00CCFF, from the 216-color palette browsers agreed on before displays could be trusted with more.
Shades, tints and tones
Every step is generated from #00D9F5. Click a swatch to copy its hex.
Shades of cyan
A shade is the base color with black mixed in. Shades read as deeper and more dramatic, and they are what you reach for when a color needs to recede or carry weight.
Tints of cyan
A tint is the base color with white mixed in. Tints turn pastel as they lighten, which makes them useful for backgrounds and for anything that has to sit behind text.
Tones of cyan
A tone is the base color with grey mixed in. Tones lose the shout without losing the hue, and they are usually what separates a considered palette from a loud one.
The cyan scale
The same color as the 50 to 950 ladder every CSS framework uses, with #00D9F5 at 500. Click a step to copy its hex, or take the whole scale as variables for a design system.
Color schemes built on cyan
Harmonies are positions on the color wheel rather than matters of taste, which is why they keep working across very different designs.
Analogous
Three neighbours on the wheel. Nothing competes, so the result reads calm and settled, closer to how colour behaves in nature.
Split complementary
The base plus the two colors either side of its complement. It keeps most of the contrast while being much easier to balance.
Triadic
Three colors spaced evenly around the wheel. Strong and lively, and usually best with one dominant color and two accents.
Tetradic
Two complementary pairs, forming a rectangle on the wheel. The richest scheme available, and the hardest to keep from shouting.
Monochromatic
One hue at different lightness levels. Effortlessly cohesive, and the safest way to build a palette around a brand color.
Colors close to #00D9F5
Near neighbours, for when this color is almost right. Each one shifts hue, saturation or lightness by a small step.
Cyan color palettes
Five-color palettes built around #00D9F5, each following a different scheme. Click any swatch to copy it, or open the generator to build your own.
Analogous
Complementary
Triadic
Monochromatic
Open the palette generator to lock the colors you like and regenerate the rest.
Contrast and readability
Whether cyan works as text, and what to put on top of it when it is the background. Ratios follow WCAG 2.1, where 4.5 is the bar for body text and 3 for large text.
Cyan text on white background
1.72:1 · PoorLarge text at 24 pixels
Body text at 16 pixels. A flat field of color removes every variable, which is what makes it useful for judging a display.
- Body AA
- Body AAA
- Large AA
- Large AAA
Cyan text on black background
12.24:1 · ExcellentLarge text at 24 pixels
Body text at 16 pixels. A flat field of color removes every variable, which is what makes it useful for judging a display.
- Body AA
- Body AAA
- Large AA
- Large AAA
Used the other way round, #00D9F5 as a background takes #000000 text. That is the higher-contrast of the two, and it is what the tool picks automatically for any chrome sitting on your color.
Cyan reads better on a black background of the two. Contrast is a property of the pair, not of one color, so a color that fails here can still be perfectly usable against a different partner.
About cyan
What this color does, where it works, and what it reveals about the screen showing it.
What cyan is
Green and blue at full output with red switched off. That makes it a two-channel test in a single field, the cool counterpart to what yellow does for red and green.
Where it works
Night exteriors, water, and any shot that needs a cool edge. It is also the standard partner to a warm key light, and a good daytime bias light behind a monitor because it matches the color of daylight.
How it reads
Cyan reads as clean, technical and cold, which is why it turns up in medical branding, electronics packaging and computer builds. It is refreshing rather than relaxing, and it makes a room feel alert rather than cosy.
On a display
Very bright, because two subpixels fire and one of them is green, the color your eye is most sensitive to. That brightness makes it a good test of uniformity at the top of a panel's range, where edge-lit banding shows most clearly.
The color of night on camera
Cool blue-green is the established visual shorthand for moonlight, so ingrained that audiences read it as night even when the scene was obviously shot in daylight. The same convention covers water, so pools and underwater sequences get pushed the same direction.
Warm and cool
Paired with orange or pink on the opposite side you get the contrast that carries an enormous amount of modern lighting design. The warm side reads as the practical light in the scene, the cool side as the night outside, and the separation is what makes an image feel deep.
Common questions
- How does a screen make cyan?
- By lighting the green and blue subpixels together with red switched off. That makes a cyan field a useful simultaneous test of those two channels, in the same way yellow tests red and green.
- What is cyan used for in lighting?
- It is the standard shorthand for moonlight, water and night exteriors on film, because cool blue-green light reads as nocturnal to an audience. It is also the usual cool counterpart in the warm-cool lighting pairs used in portraits and streaming setups.
- Why does cyan look so bright?
- Two subpixels are lit rather than one, and one of them is green, the color human vision is most sensitive to. Cyan is among the brightest colors a display can produce short of white.
- Is cyan the same as turquoise or aqua?
- Loosely, yes. Cyan is the precise term for the green-blue mix a display produces with red off. Turquoise and aqua are common names for shades near it, usually slightly greener or lighter.
Share