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Quiet Mocha

#e1b86f
Notes

Quiet Mocha (#E1B86F) is a true amber 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 (38°, 66%, 66%) 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 azure. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#e1b86f
RGB
rgb(225, 184, 111)
HSL
hsl(38, 66%, 66%)
HWB
hwb(38 44% 12%)
OKLCH
oklch(80.3% 0.103 80.9)
P3
color(display-p3 0.8567 0.7277 0.4758)
HSV
hsv(38, 51%, 88%)
LAB
lab(76.94% 5.85 42.40)
LCH
lch(76.94% 42.80 82.15)
CMYK
cmyk(0%, 18%, 51%, 12%)

Etymology

Quiet
adjective

Latin quietus, at rest — used as a color modifier since the medieval period for hues that read as restrained. Quiet pink, quiet blue: low saturation combined with optical calmness. Sits across the crisp and hushed buckets where the color is present but doesn't ask for attention.

Mocha
noun

A variety of agate from the Yemeni port of al-Mukhā — characterized by tree-like dendritic inclusions in a yellow-tan ground. Also the Yemeni coffee that gave its name to the chocolate-coffee drink. The color refers to a polished mocha-agate cabochon: a soft, slightly muted warm tan with the matte finish of cryptocrystalline silica.

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.

#e1b86f
Original
#c9b869
Protanopia
#d3c271
Deuteranopia
#f1aca6
Tritanopia
#bbbbbb
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
1.86:1
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
11.29:1

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
##E1B86F
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.8567 0.7277 0.4758)
P3 has subtle headroomOKLCH chroma 0.103

Moderately saturated colors gain a small bump in P3 — the difference is usually visible side-by-side on wide-gamut hardware but won't change the character of the color.

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