colors
Back to gallery

Steady Polynesia

#85e8bd
Notes

Steady Polynesia (#85E8BD) is a soft 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 (154°, 68%, 72%) places it in the balanced band at a light lightness. It works as a background wash, large-area fill, or soft illustration tone. Add a darker ink of the same hue when you need type over it. For a confident two-color system, pair it with its complementary magenta. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#85e8bd
RGB
rgb(133, 232, 189)
HSL
hsl(154, 68%, 72%)
HWB
hwb(154 52% 9%)
OKLCH
oklch(85.8% 0.112 164.2)
HSV
hsv(154, 43%, 91%)
LAB
lab(85.19% -38.77 11.93)
LCH
lch(85.19% 40.57 162.90)
CMYK
cmyk(43%, 0%, 19%, 9%)

Etymology

Steady
adjective

Old English stede, place, position — drifted to mean firm and unmoving. Used as a color modifier since the seventeenth century for hues that read as reliable rather than dramatic. Steady gray, steady green: moderate saturation combined with optical calmness. Sits in the crisp-bucket center alongside settled.

Polynesia
noun

The vast triangle of Pacific islands — Hawaii, New Zealand, Easter Island, and the islands between. Polynesia refers to the unifying lagoon-blue-green of Polynesian atolls: a saturated, slightly cool deep blue-green with the optical clarity of warm Pacific lagoon water across thousands of cultural-cousin atolls.

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.

#85e8bd
Original
#e5dbbb
Protanopia
#d5d0c0
Deuteranopia
#69e8dc
Tritanopia
#d0d0d0
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
1.47:1
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
14.27:1

Related Colors

Canvas