colors
Back to gallery

Dependable Amber

#e7cd87
Notes

Dependable Amber (#E7CD87) is a soft 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 (44°, 67%, 72%) 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 azure. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#e7cd87
RGB
rgb(231, 205, 135)
HSL
hsl(44, 67%, 72%)
HWB
hwb(44 53% 9%)
OKLCH
oklch(85.5% 0.093 89.9)
P3
color(display-p3 0.8889 0.8076 0.5643)
HSV
hsv(44, 42%, 91%)
LAB
lab(83.13% -0.36 38.15)
LCH
lch(83.13% 38.15 90.55)
CMYK
cmyk(0%, 11%, 42%, 9%)

Etymology

Dependable
adjective

Latin dē-pendere, to hang from — adjectival suffix -able. As a color modifier, dependable implies a clear-and-trustworthy-and-consistent quality where the hue carries the visual register of consistently-performing-and-counted-on design-element. Sits at the crisp-and-honest end of the grid, parallel to reliable and trustworthy in usage.

Amber
noun

Fossilized tree resin — pine and conifer sap that flowed sixty million years ago and slowly polymerized in Baltic and Dominican forests. The color refers to a polished cabochon of true Baltic amber: a warm, slightly translucent gold-orange with the depth of resin and the occasional inclusion of trapped insects. Softer than honey, deeper than topaz, with the mineral light of a fossil that still feels organic.

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.

#e7cd87
Original
#dccb82
Protanopia
#e2d289
Deuteranopia
#f5c2bb
Tritanopia
#cdcdcd
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
1.56:1
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
13.48:1

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
##E7CD87
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.8889 0.8076 0.5643)
P3 has subtle headroomOKLCH chroma 0.093

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.

Related Colors

Canvas