colors
Back to gallery

Scorching Spring

#a1ef9c
Notes

Scorching Spring (#A1EF9C) is a soft green 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 (116°, 72%, 77%) 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 violet. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#a1ef9c
RGB
rgb(161, 239, 156)
HSL
hsl(116, 72%, 77%)
HWB
hwb(116 61% 6%)
OKLCH
oklch(88.1% 0.136 142.9)
HSV
hsv(116, 35%, 94%)
LAB
lab(87.83% -39.74 32.77)
LCH
lch(87.83% 51.51 140.49)
CMYK
cmyk(33%, 0%, 35%, 6%)

Etymology

Scorching
adjective

Old English scorcnian, to dry up — present-participle of scorch. As a color modifier, scorching implies a saturated-and-burning-hot quality, the bright color of Mojave-Desert-and-Death-Valley mid-afternoon high-temperature surface-emission. Sits at the bright-and-warm end of the grid, parallel to searing and sizzling in usage.

Spring
noun

The season — and the color of the new chlorophyll that appears with it. Spring green refers to the saturated, slightly yellow-shifted green of a temperate-zone canopy in early May: a clean, optically bright green with the translucent quality of new leaf tissue against the sun. Cooler than chartreuse, lighter than fern, with the seasonal optimism of a color that lasts only the few weeks before summer settles in.

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.

#a1ef9c
Original
#f3e196
Protanopia
#e7d9a1
Deuteranopia
#9aeada
Tritanopia
#d8d8d8
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
1.37:1
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
15.34:1

Related Colors

Canvas