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Splashy Bonaire

#21c9a1
Notes

Splashy Bonaire (#21C9A1) is a true teal with a vibrant character. It holds its own as a focal accent, carrying visual weight without tipping into neon territory. Its HSL profile (166°, 72%, 46%) places it in the balanced band at a mid lightness. It works across type, buttons, and borders, saturated enough to feel deliberate but balanced enough to not fight the rest of the palette. 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
#21c9a1
RGB
rgb(33, 201, 161)
HSL
hsl(166, 72%, 46%)
HWB
hwb(166 13% 21%)
OKLCH
oklch(74.7% 0.141 171.0)
P3
color(display-p3 0.3753 0.7768 0.6398)
HSV
hsv(166, 84%, 79%)
LAB
lab(72.67% -49.74 8.62)
LCH
lch(72.67% 50.48 170.16)
CMYK
cmyk(84%, 0%, 20%, 21%)

Etymology

Splashy
adjective

Imitative-onomatopoeic origin — adjectival suffix -y, evoking the sound of liquid impact. As a color modifier, splashy implies a saturated-and-attention-grabbing-and-bold quality, the bright color of Pop-Art-and-1950s-Tiki mid-century-modern showy-decor advertising-and-display. Sits at the bright-and-flamboyant end of the grid, parallel to showy and flamboyant in usage.

Bonaire
noun

The Dutch Caribbean island — and the saturated blue-green of Bonaire's marine-park reef waters, designated the world's first national-park dive zone in 1979. Bonaire refers to the lagoon water around Klein Bonaire: a saturated, slightly cool deep blue-green with the optical clarity of southern Caribbean reef water.

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.

#21c9a1
Original
#c3bb9f
Protanopia
#afaca4
Deuteranopia
#00cbbe
Tritanopia
#a2a2a2
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).
Failon White
2.11:1
The quick brown foxSample body text at normal size. The wcag minimum for body contrast is 4.5:1 (AA) or 7:1 (AAA).
AAAon Black
9.93:1

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
##21C9A1
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.3753 0.7768 0.6398)
P3 has subtle headroomOKLCH chroma 0.141

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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