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Pragmatic Blithe Teal

#38b8a7
Notes

Pragmatic Blithe Teal (#38B8A7) is a true teal with an earthy character. It leans grounded and natural, the kind of color that plays well with wood, clay, linen, and warm neutrals. Its HSL profile (172°, 53%, 47%) 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
#38b8a7
RGB
rgb(56, 184, 167)
HSL
hsl(172, 53%, 47%)
HWB
hwb(172 22% 28%)
OKLCH
oklch(71.0% 0.112 182.3)
P3
color(display-p3 0.3775 0.7116 0.6555)
HSV
hsv(172, 70%, 72%)
LAB
lab(67.95% -38.37 -1.43)
LCH
lch(67.95% 38.39 182.14)
CMYK
cmyk(70%, 0%, 9%, 28%)

Etymology

Pragmatic
adjective

Greek pragmatikós, of business / practical — adjectival suffix -ic. As a color modifier, pragmatic implies a clear-and-purpose-fit-and-no-nonsense quality where the hue carries the visual register of straightforward-utilitarian-and-functional decision-making. Sits at the crisp-and-functional end of the grid, parallel to practical and functional in usage.

Blithe
modifier

Old English blīthe, joyful-and-kind. As a color modifier, blithe implies a carefree-and-light-hearted-and-cheerful quality, the visual register of Shakespearean-pastoral-and-Forest-of-Arden-blithe hand-carefree-and-light-hearted-and-cheerful Shakespearean-pastoral-and-Forest-of-Arden-and-As-You-Like-It blithe-and-carefree-and-light-hearted-and-cheerful surfaces under Shakespearean-pastoral-and-Forest-of-Arden-and-As-You-Like-It English-greenwood-and-shepherd's-meadow Maytime-light. Sits at the modifier-and-mood end of the grid, parallel to merry and jolly in usage.

Teal
noun

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 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.

#38b8a7
Original
#afada6
Protanopia
#9da0a9
Deuteranopia
#00bcb3
Tritanopia
#9c9c9c
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
2.45:1
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
8.58:1

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
##38B8A7
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.3775 0.7116 0.6555)
P3 has subtle headroomOKLCH chroma 0.112

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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