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Plain Agua

#75bcae
Notes

Plain Agua (#75BCAE) is a true teal 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 (168°, 35%, 60%) 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
#75bcae
RGB
rgb(117, 188, 174)
HSL
hsl(168, 35%, 60%)
HWB
hwb(168 46% 26%)
OKLCH
oklch(74.4% 0.075 180.2)
P3
color(display-p3 0.5226 0.7301 0.6835)
HSV
hsv(168, 38%, 74%)
LAB
lab(71.42% -25.55 0.05)
LCH
lch(71.42% 25.55 179.90)
CMYK
cmyk(38%, 0%, 7%, 26%)

Etymology

Plain
adjective

Latin planus, flat, level — used as a color modifier since the medieval period for hues that read as undecorated and direct. Plain white, plain blue: moderate saturation, no shift, no surface effect. Sits in the crisp-bucket center, with the implication of restraint rather than absence.

Agua
noun

The Spanish word for water — used in agua fresca, agua marina (sea water), and the pale blue-green tile of Andalusian fountains. The color refers to a Sevillian agua-tile fountain: a soft, slightly cool pale blue-green with the high gloss of fired Andalusian ceramic.

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.

#75bcae
Original
#b6b4ad
Protanopia
#aaabaf
Deuteranopia
#5dbeb8
Tritanopia
#acacac
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
2.20:1
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
9.56:1

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
##75BCAE
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.5226 0.7301 0.6835)
Inside sRGBOKLCH chroma 0.075

This color sits well within the sRGB cube. P3 and sRGB share the gray axis and most desaturated tones, so a P3 display renders this identically to an sRGB display.

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