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Flashing Geel

#abbd2b
Notes

Flashing Geel (#ABBD2B) 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 (67°, 63%, 45%) 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 blue. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#abbd2b
RGB
rgb(171, 189, 43)
HSL
hsl(67, 63%, 45%)
HWB
hwb(67 17% 26%)
OKLCH
oklch(75.9% 0.162 116.7)
HSV
hsv(67, 77%, 74%)
LAB
lab(73.04% -23.96 65.92)
LCH
lch(73.04% 70.14 109.97)
CMYK
cmyk(10%, 0%, 77%, 26%)

Etymology

Flashing
adjective

Old English flasch, flash — present-participle of flash. As a color modifier, flashing implies a saturated-and-rapid-on-off quality, the bright color of emergency-vehicle and photographic-flash light-burst surfaces. Sits at the bright-and-flashing end of the grid, parallel to coruscating and flickering in usage.

Geel
noun

The Dutch word for yellow — used in the painted facades of Amsterdam canal houses, the Vermeer-painted lemon yellow of Dutch genre painting, and the bright yellow tulip cultivars of Dutch flower auctions. The color refers to geel-painted seventeenth-century Dutch shutters: a saturated, slightly cool yellow with the matte finish of lead-and-oil paint.

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.

#abbd2b
Original
#cab300
Protanopia
#c9b439
Deuteranopia
#b6b2a2
Tritanopia
#afafaf
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
2.09:1
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
10.05:1

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