Color Accessibility & Readability

Accessibility & Readability

Make color easier to see, read and understand with better contrast and accessible choices.

Banner with a humorous dialogue between #000000 and #17201B on a white background, framed by several black and near-black color blocks.

The Best Black Text Colors on White: 8 Readable HEX Codes

Black text on a white background sounds like the easiest color decision in design. Choose #000000. Done. Except there is a surprising amount of room between pure black and something […]

Abstract arrangement of navy, cream, sage green, and gray color panels with small ceramic objects, illustrating website header color combinations.

How to Choose Background and Text Colors for a Website

Open a new website project and one of the first decisions looks almost suspiciously easy: What color should the page be? White is safe. Black text is readable. Done. Except […]

Three large letterforms in different type styles displayed on separate cards, illustrating how typography changes the appearance of text.

Your font changes how text color works

A text color can have excellent contrast and still be surprisingly hard to read. Because we do not read contrast ratios. We read letters. And the size, weight and shape […]

Three status colors shown alone and again with success, warning and error icons and labels, illustrating why meaning should not depend on color alone.

Color should help, not do all the talking

Green means success. Red means error. Blue means link. Usually. But color meanings are learned, contextual and not always perceived in the same way. A green dot may look obviously […]

Five text colors on white compared by contrast ratio, with four readable examples and one low-contrast example that fails.

The best text color for a website? Not always black

Black text on a white background works. Very well, in fact. But that does not mean every paragraph, heading, label and button on your website needs to be dressed in […]