colors
Back to gallery

Sterile Eros Lazuli

#53caeb
Notes

Sterile Eros Lazuli (#53CAEB) is a true cyan with a vibrant character. It holds its own as a focal accent, carrying visual weight without tipping into neon territory. Its HSL profile (193°, 79%, 62%) 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
#53caeb
RGB
rgb(83, 202, 235)
HSL
hsl(193, 79%, 62%)
HWB
hwb(193 33% 8%)
OKLCH
oklch(78.5% 0.115 219.4)
P3
color(display-p3 0.4565 0.7821 0.9067)
HSV
hsv(193, 65%, 92%)
LAB
lab(76.11% -23.36 -26.17)
LCH
lch(76.11% 35.08 228.24)
CMYK
cmyk(65%, 14%, 0%, 8%)

Etymology

Sterile
adjective

Latin sterilis, barren / not-fertile — sharing root with Greek steiros (barren). As a color modifier, sterile implies a clear-and-medical-clean-and-stripped quality, the crisp color of operating-theater surgical-environment white-and-stainless-steel surfaces. Sits at the crisp-and-clean end of the grid, parallel to sanitary and hygienic in usage.

Eros
modifier

Greek Ἔρως, god-of-love-and-desire. As a color modifier, eros implies a winged-love-and-arrow-of-desire quality, the visual register of Praxiteles-Eros-and-Roman-Cupid hand-winged-love-and-arrow-of-desire Praxiteles-Eros-and-Roman-Cupid-and-Pompeii-fresco eros-and-winged-love-and-arrow-of-desire surfaces under Praxiteles-Eros-and-Roman-Cupid-and-Pompeii-fresco Hellenistic-and-Roman-Pompeii rose-and-myrtle-light. Sits at the modifier-and-myth end of the grid, parallel to zeus and hera in usage.

Lazuli
noun

Passerina amoena, the lazuli bunting — a North American songbird whose males display saturated deep-blue plumage with white wing bars and chestnut breasts. Named for the gemstone (lapis lazuli) the bird's plumage resembles. The color refers to a male lazuli bunting in breeding plumage: a saturated, slightly cool deep blue.

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.

#53caeb
Original
#b5c5ed
Protanopia
#a0b5eb
Deuteranopia
#00d5d4
Tritanopia
#b3b3b3
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
1.91:1
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
11.02:1

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
##53CAEB
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.4565 0.7821 0.9067)
P3 has subtle headroomOKLCH chroma 0.115

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.

Related Colors

Canvas