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Fiery Caribbean

#51f9fc
Notes

Fiery Caribbean (#51F9FC) is a true cyan with a neon character. It sits at the high-saturation edge of its family. Use it sparingly, as signage, accent, or highlight against darker surfaces. Its HSL profile (181°, 97%, 65%) places it in the highly saturated band at a mid 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
#51f9fc
RGB
rgb(81, 249, 252)
HSL
hsl(181, 97%, 65%)
HWB
hwb(181 32% 1%)
OKLCH
oklch(89.9% 0.135 196.8)
P3
color(display-p3 0.5229 0.9633 0.9806)
HSV
hsv(181, 68%, 99%)
LAB
lab(90.10% -41.10 -14.00)
LCH
lch(90.10% 43.42 198.81)
CMYK
cmyk(68%, 1%, 0%, 1%)

Etymology

Fiery
adjective

Old English fȳr, fire — adjectival suffix -y. As a color modifier, fiery implies a saturated-and-bright-flaming quality, the bright color of autumn-foliage fall-color and forge-furnace hot-iron emission. Sits at the bright-and-warm end of the grid, parallel to flaming and blazing in usage.

Caribbean
noun

The Caribbean Sea — the tropical basin between the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic, ringed by Cuba, Hispaniola, the Lesser Antilles, and the Central American mainland. The color refers to mid-depth Caribbean water on a sunny day: a saturated, slightly muted blue-green with the optical complexity of pure water filtered through coral sand. Cooler than turquoise, warmer than azure, with the postcard weight of a sea named for its indigenous people.

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.

#51f9fc
Original
#e8edfd
Protanopia
#cfdbfd
Deuteranopia
#00fff9
Tritanopia
#d5d5d5
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
1.29:1
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
16.31:1

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
##51F9FC
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.5229 0.9633 0.9806)
P3 has subtle headroomOKLCH chroma 0.135

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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