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Spotless Aisle Kingfisher

#03a1ac
Notes

Spotless Aisle Kingfisher (#03A1AC) is a deep cyan 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 (184°, 97%, 34%) places it in the highly saturated band at a dark 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.

HEX
#03a1ac
RGB
rgb(3, 161, 172)
HSL
hsl(184, 97%, 34%)
HWB
hwb(184 1% 33%)
OKLCH
oklch(64.6% 0.110 203.4)
P3
color(display-p3 0.2807 0.6218 0.6663)
HSV
hsv(184, 98%, 67%)
LAB
lab(60.32% -30.48 -15.66)
LCH
lch(60.32% 34.26 207.19)
CMYK
cmyk(98%, 6%, 0%, 33%)

Etymology

Spotless
adjective

Old English spott (spot) plus suffix -less. As a color modifier, spotless implies a clear-and-unmarked quality where the hue carries no contaminating speck or stain. Sits at the crisp-and-clean end of the grid, parallel to pristine and unblemished in usage.

Aisle
modifier

Old French aisile, side-aisle. As a color modifier, aisle implies a side-aisle-flanking-nave quality, the visual register of Romanesque-and-Gothic-cathedral hand-built side-aisle-and-arcade column-and-arch flanking-the-nave architectural surfaces under Gothic-and-Romanesque side-aisle filtered light. Sits at the modifier-and-architecture end of the grid, parallel to nave and apse in usage.

Kingfisher
noun

The family Alcedinidae — particularly Alcedo atthis, the European common kingfisher whose iridescent turquoise-blue plumage gives the color its name. The color refers to a male European kingfisher's wing: a saturated, slightly cool deep blue-green with the iridescent satin finish of structurally colored feathers.

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 explore

Harmonies

Accessibility

Color-vision simulation

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.

#03a1ac
Original
#939aad
Protanopia
#7f8bac
Deuteranopia
#00a8a4
Tritanopia
#808080
Achromatopsia
WCAG contrast

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.

The quick brown foxSample body text at normal size. The wcag minimum for body contrast is 4.5:1 (AA) or 7:1 (AAA).
AA Largeon White
3.14:1
The quick brown foxSample body text at normal size. The wcag minimum for body contrast is 4.5:1 (AA) or 7:1 (AAA).
AAon Black
6.70:1

Wide gamut

Display P3 representation

The CSS Color 4 wide-gamut form of this color. Both swatches render the same color on every display — the P3 form only diverges from sRGB when a designer pushes channels outside sRGB's reach.

sRGB hex
sRGB hex
##03A1AC
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.2807 0.6218 0.6663)
P3 has subtle headroomOKLCH chroma 0.110

Moderately saturated colors gain a small bump in P3 — the difference is usually visible side-by-side on wide-gamut hardware but won't change the character of the color.

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