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Direct Hauyne

#78a9a0
Notes

Direct Hauyne (#78A9A0) 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 (169°, 22%, 57%) places it in the muted 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
#78a9a0
RGB
rgb(120, 169, 160)
HSL
hsl(169, 22%, 57%)
HWB
hwb(169 47% 34%)
OKLCH
oklch(69.7% 0.054 182.0)
P3
color(display-p3 0.5116 0.6575 0.6278)
HSV
hsv(169, 29%, 66%)
LAB
lab(65.68% -18.26 -0.61)
LCH
lch(65.68% 18.27 181.90)
CMYK
cmyk(29%, 0%, 5%, 34%)

Etymology

Direct
adjective

From the Latin directus, straight — used as a color modifier since the eighteenth century for hues that read as straightforward and unambiguous. Direct red, direct green: moderate-to-high saturation combined with optical clarity. Sits at the crisp-bucket center alongside clear and frank.

Hauyne
noun

A blue-to-green variety of the lazurite mineral group — used in classical Egyptian and Mesoamerican blue pigments and modern fine jewelry. The color refers to a polished hauyne specimen: a saturated, slightly cool deep blue-green with the matte finish of sodium-aluminum silicate.

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.

#78a9a0
Original
#a5a3a0
Protanopia
#9c9da1
Deuteranopia
#69aba6
Tritanopia
#9e9e9e
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
2.63:1
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
7.98:1

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
##78A9A0
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.5116 0.6575 0.6278)
Inside sRGBOKLCH chroma 0.054

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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