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Practical Snapdragon

#9faa79
Notes

Practical Snapdragon (#9FAA79) is a true yellow with a warm character. It leans warm, pulling light toward red, orange, and yellow. Naturally inviting, it suits editorial and hospitality contexts. Its HSL profile (73°, 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 indigo. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#9faa79
RGB
rgb(159, 170, 121)
HSL
hsl(73, 22%, 57%)
HWB
hwb(73 47% 33%)
OKLCH
oklch(71.7% 0.069 118.4)
P3
color(display-p3 0.6315 0.6653 0.4946)
HSV
hsv(73, 29%, 67%)
LAB
lab(67.65% -12.28 24.03)
LCH
lch(67.65% 26.99 117.07)
CMYK
cmyk(6%, 0%, 29%, 33%)

Etymology

Practical
adjective

Greek praktikós, practical — adjectival suffix -al. As a color modifier, practical implies a clear-and-purpose-fit-and-everyday quality where the hue carries the visual register of Shaker-and-Quaker utilitarian-and-functional everyday-life craft. Sits at the crisp-and-functional end of the grid, parallel to functional and workmanlike in usage.

Snapdragon
noun

The genus Antirrhinum — particularly A. majus, the cottage-garden biennial whose tall flower spikes feature snapping dragon-mouth blooms in pinks, oranges, and yellows. The color refers to a yellow snapdragon bloom: a saturated, slightly red-shifted bright yellow with the matte finish of bee-pollinated flower stack.

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.

#9faa79
Original
#b0a576
Protanopia
#afa57b
Deuteranopia
#a4a59d
Tritanopia
#a4a4a4
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
2.47:1
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
8.50:1

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
##9FAA79
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.6315 0.6653 0.4946)
Inside sRGBOKLCH chroma 0.069

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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