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Heavy Pollux violet

#8a2cd8
Notes

Heavy Pollux violet (#8A2CD8) is a true indigo with a vibrant character. It holds its own as a focal accent, carrying visual weight without tipping into neon territory. Its HSL profile (273°, 69%, 51%) 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 lime. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#8a2cd8
RGB
rgb(138, 44, 216)
HSL
hsl(273, 69%, 51%)
HWB
hwb(273 17% 15%)
OKLCH
oklch(52.6% 0.240 303.5)
P3
color(display-p3 0.4994 0.1990 0.8161)
HSV
hsv(273, 80%, 85%)
LAB
lab(41.47% 67.30 -70.21)
LCH
lch(41.47% 97.26 313.79)
CMYK
cmyk(36%, 80%, 0%, 15%)

Etymology

Heavy
adjective

Old English hefig, weighty — cognate with heave. Used as a color modifier since at least the seventeenth century to indicate weight in saturation as much as value: heavy with pigment, heavy-bodied. In the engine's adjective grid, heavy sits alongside deep and plush in the dark-and-saturated quadrant. Closer to a fabric description than a pure value word.

Pollux
modifier

Greek Πολυδεύκης, Gemini-twin-and-immortal-boxer. As a color modifier, pollux implies a Gemini-twin-and-immortal-brother quality, the visual register of Gemini-Pollux-and-Castor-twin hand-Gemini-twin-and-immortal-brother Gemini-Pollux-and-Castor-twin-and-Argonaut pollux-and-Gemini-twin-and-immortal-brother surfaces under Gemini-Pollux-and-Castor-twin-and-Argonaut spring-Gemini-and-Bortle-1-sky stellar-twin-light. Sits at the modifier-and-cosmic end of the grid, parallel to castor and spica in usage.

violet
noun

Viola odorata, the European sweet violet — small, fragrant, and the original meaning of the color name in English (the Violet of the rainbow). The color refers to a fresh sweet violet blossom in late winter: a saturated, slightly red-shifted deep blue-purple with the matte finish of small five-petaled flower. Cooler than amethyst, warmer than indigo, with the perfumed weight of a flower used in Roman garlands and Victorian eau de toilette.

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.

#8a2cd8
Original
#0060dd
Protanopia
#0061d5
Deuteranopia
#7a5b83
Tritanopia
#4c4c4c
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).
AAon White
6.12:1
The quick brown foxSample body text at normal size. The wcag minimum for body contrast is 4.5:1 (AA) or 7:1 (AAA).
AA Largeon Black
3.43:1

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
##8A2CD8
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.4994 0.1990 0.8161)
P3 has visible headroomOKLCH chroma 0.240

This color is chromatic enough that authoring it as P3 native (instead of clamping to sRGB) gives a perceptibly more saturated render on wide-gamut displays — modern Macs, iPhones, iPads, and most recent OLED laptops.

Related Colors

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