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Pitchy Cobalto

#203c7b
Notes

Pitchy Cobalto (#203C7B) is a deep azure with a cool character. It leans cool, sitting on the blue, green, and violet side of the wheel. Quiet and dependable, a fit for product UI and data visualization. Its HSL profile (222°, 59%, 30%) places it in the balanced band at a dark lightness. It works well as a headline, icon, or deep background in an otherwise light layout, pairing cleanly with cream, bone, and warm neutrals. For a confident two-color system, pair it with its complementary amber. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#203c7b
RGB
rgb(32, 60, 123)
HSL
hsl(222, 59%, 30%)
HWB
hwb(222 13% 52%)
OKLCH
oklch(37.2% 0.113 263.8)
P3
color(display-p3 0.1513 0.2325 0.4659)
HSV
hsv(222, 74%, 48%)
LAB
lab(26.64% 12.87 -39.00)
LCH
lch(26.64% 41.07 288.27)
CMYK
cmyk(74%, 51%, 0%, 52%)

Etymology

Pitchy
adjective

Old English pic, pitch — adjectival suffix -y. As a color modifier, pitchy implies the deep-glossy-black quality of bitumen-and-pine-pitch viscous-residue surfaces, particularly the Norse-and-Viking longship-pine-tar caulking. Sits at the deepest-warm end of the grid, parallel to tarry and warmer than Stygian.

Cobalto
noun

The Italian word for cobalt — used for the saturated deep blue of cobalto-glaze on Tuscan and Venetian Renaissance ceramics. The color refers to a cobalto-glazed Tuscan piatto: a saturated, slightly cool deep blue with the high gloss of cobalt-glazed porcelain. The Italian cousin of cobalt.

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.

#203c7b
Original
#18437d
Protanopia
#003b7a
Deuteranopia
#004b55
Tritanopia
#3b3b3b
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).
AAAon White
10.53:1
The quick brown foxSample body text at normal size. The wcag minimum for body contrast is 4.5:1 (AA) or 7:1 (AAA).
Failon Black
1.99:1

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
##203C7B
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.1513 0.2325 0.4659)
P3 has subtle headroomOKLCH chroma 0.113

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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