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Trustworthy Corona Kingfisher

#2b9ba6
Notes

Trustworthy Corona Kingfisher (#2B9BA6) is a true cyan 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 (185°, 59%, 41%) 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
#2b9ba6
RGB
rgb(43, 155, 166)
HSL
hsl(185, 59%, 41%)
HWB
hwb(185 17% 35%)
OKLCH
oklch(63.4% 0.097 204.8)
HSV
hsv(185, 74%, 65%)
LAB
lab(58.70% -26.61 -14.67)
LCH
lch(58.70% 30.38 208.87)
CMYK
cmyk(74%, 7%, 0%, 35%)

Etymology

Trustworthy
adjective

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.

Corona
modifier

Latin corona, crown-or-circle-of-light. As a color modifier, corona implies a sun-corona-and-eclipse-halo quality, the visual register of total-solar-eclipse-corona hand-sun-corona-and-eclipse-halo total-solar-eclipse-and-Sun-corona-and-Bailey's-Beads corona-and-sun-corona-and-eclipse-halo surfaces under total-solar-eclipse-and-Sun-corona-and-Bailey's-Beads totality-and-Moon-shadow-and-pearl ring-of-fire-light. Sits at the modifier-and-cosmic end of the grid, parallel to prism and nebula 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.

#2b9ba6
Original
#8e94a7
Protanopia
#7d88a6
Deuteranopia
#00a29e
Tritanopia
#848484
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
3.31:1
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
6.34:1

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