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Radiant Nocturne

#9c73f6
Notes

Radiant Nocturne (#9C73F6) is a soft indigo 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 (259°, 88%, 71%) places it in the highly saturated band at a light 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 lime. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#9c73f6
RGB
rgb(156, 115, 246)
HSL
hsl(259, 88%, 71%)
HWB
hwb(259 45% 4%)
OKLCH
oklch(65.7% 0.189 295.1)
HSV
hsv(259, 53%, 96%)
LAB
lab(58.02% 44.28 -60.26)
LCH
lch(58.02% 74.78 306.31)
CMYK
cmyk(37%, 53%, 0%, 4%)

Etymology

Radiant
adjective

From the Latin radiare, to emit rays — used as a color word since the seventeenth century for hues that read as luminous and emitting. Radiant gold, radiant pink: the implication is high luminance combined with the optical impression of an outward light. Sits in the bright-bucket center alongside glowing.

Nocturne
noun

French nocturne, night-piece — adopted into music by John Field (Irish, 1812) and Frédéric Chopin (Polish, 1827–46) for piano character pieces evoking nighttime, and into painting by James McNeill Whistler for a series of deep-blue-violet Thames-river twilights. Nocturne color refers to a Whistler Nocturne in Black and Gold foreground tonality: a saturated, slightly cool deep blue-violet with the soft finish of thinned oil over warm gesso.

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

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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.

#9c73f6
Original
#3a8dfa
Protanopia
#4589f3
Deuteranopia
#868eaa
Tritanopia
#858585
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).
AA Largeon White
3.39:1
The quick brown foxSample body text at normal size. The wcag minimum for body contrast is 4.5:1 (AA) or 7:1 (AAA).
AAon Black
6.20:1

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