HTML Color Guidelines

Guidelines: Browser-Safe Colors People-Safe Colors Brand Colors Link Colors Text Colors

Browser-Safe Colors

Where practical, only use the 216 browser-safe colors that are defined in the browser-safe color look up table (CLUT).
Clearly define these colors using some form of the RGB notation.

Rationale:

Browser-safe colors:
- Are directly supported by the major:
  - Graphic browsers (e.g., Internet Exployer, Netscape, and Mosaic).
  - Operating systems (e.g., Macintosh and Windows).
  - Hardware platforms (e.g., IBM, HP, Dell, Gateway, etc.).
- Will therefore not change unexpectedly when porting from one browser, operating system, and platform to another.
- Will not cause dithering (i.e., spotty colors that approximate the unsupported colors) on displays that are set to 256 colors.
RGB notation is standard and likely to be supported across all graphic browsers, whereas English names (e.g., seashell instead of #FFF5EE) are more likely to be supported neither widely nor standardly.

Use people-safe colors:

Do not place visually-conflicting primary colors (e.g., red and green) next to each other.
Avoid using different primary colors with the same saturation.

Rationale:

Such colors cause eye strain because the lens of the eye cannot focus them simultaneously because of their differing wavelengths.
Such colors are difficult for color-blind persons to read because they lack the necessary contrast to make up for the missing hue information.

Use text, image, and background colors that are compatible with the brand colors of the website owner.
Do not use the brand colors of the major competitors of the website owner.

Rationale:

This re-enforces the brand of the website owner, rather than that of his/her competitors.

Consistently use different colors to differentiate:

Rationale:

Limit the amount and number of colors used for text.
Rationale: