Trustworthy Sheet Teal
Trustworthy Sheet Teal (#01B4A1) is a true teal with a jewel character. It carries the deep, saturated richness of a gemstone. Authoritative and slightly formal, it works well for type and heavy UI elements. Its HSL profile (174°, 99%, 35%) places it in the highly saturated band at a mid lightness. Best used in small doses, like logos, CTAs, focus rings, or highlight text, where its saturation becomes a feature rather than noise. For a confident two-color system, pair it with its complementary red. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.
Etymology
Old English trēow, trust — adjectival suffix -worthy. As a color modifier, trustworthy implies a clear-and-reliable-and-honest quality where the hue carries the visual register of confidence-deserving-and-faithful-performance design-element. Sits at the crisp-and-honest end of the grid, parallel to reliable and dependable in usage.
Old English scēate, rope-attached-to-sail. As a color modifier, sheet implies a rope-attached-to-sail-corner quality, the visual register of Tall-Ship-and-yacht-sheet hand-tied rope-attached-to-sail-corner mainsheet-and-jibsheet maritime-rigging surfaces under tall-ship-sheet-and-mainsheet maritime-rigging light. Sits at the modifier-and-nautical end of the grid, parallel to knot and sail in usage.
Anas crecca, the small dabbling duck whose male in breeding plumage sports a chestnut head crossed by a glossy green-blue stripe. The color refers to that stripe — the iridescent panel just behind the eye: a saturated, slightly muted blue-green with the optical depth of structural color rather than pigment. Cooler than cypress, warmer than cerulean, with the ornithological specificity of a color named for one feather of one bird.
Closest matches
The nearest named color in three reference sources, ranked by perceptual distance (ΔE76 in CIELAB). ΔE < 1 is imperceptible to most viewers; ΔE > 10 is clearly different. When two sources point to the same hex they’re merged into one tile; click any to open that color’s page.
Variations
Click any swatch to exploreHarmonies
Accessibility
How this color appears to viewers with the four major color-vision-deficiency types. Computed via the Machado (2009) physiologically-based model. If a tile matches the original, the color reads the same to that viewer.
The color used as foreground text against pure white and pure black, with the contrast ratio and WCAG 2.1 grade. Aim for AA (4.5:1) for body text and AA Large (3:1) for 18 pt+ headlines; AAA (7:1) is the gold standard for long-form reading surfaces.