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Snowy Bleu

#a2bacb
Notes

Snowy Bleu (#A2BACB) is a soft azure 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 (205°, 28%, 72%) places it in the muted 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 orange. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#a2bacb
RGB
rgb(162, 186, 203)
HSL
hsl(205, 28%, 72%)
HWB
hwb(205 64% 20%)
OKLCH
oklch(77.6% 0.036 238.8)
P3
color(display-p3 0.6533 0.7265 0.7891)
HSV
hsv(205, 20%, 80%)
LAB
lab(74.26% -4.51 -11.30)
LCH
lch(74.26% 12.17 248.23)
CMYK
cmyk(20%, 8%, 0%, 20%)

Etymology

Snowy
adjective

An adjectival form of snow — used as a color modifier since the medieval period for hues with the optical brightness of fresh snow. Snowy white, snowy pink: very low saturation combined with high lightness and a slight cool shift. Sits at the pale-bucket alongside iced and frosted.

Bleu
noun

The French word for blue — used across French art vocabulary from bleu de Prusse (Prussian blue) to bleu de Sèvres (Sèvres porcelain blue). The color refers to a Bleu de France heraldic field: a saturated, slightly cool deep blue with the matte finish of dyed wool. The French cousin of blue.

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.

#a2bacb
Original
#b3b9cc
Protanopia
#adb5cb
Deuteranopia
#97bebf
Tritanopia
#b6b6b6
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
2.01:1
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
10.42:1

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
##A2BACB
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.6533 0.7265 0.7891)
Inside sRGBOKLCH chroma 0.036

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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