ColorXprez

#4E5657

Charcoal · dark neutral

About #4E5657

#4E5657 is a near-neutral, dark shade in the gray family. On screen it is built from 31% red, 34% green and 34% blue; for print, its CMYK mix is 10% cyan, 1% magenta, 0% yellow and 66% black. It is close to neutral, so it sits comfortably next to both warm and cool colours.

Of the common colour names it is similar to Charcoal (ΔE 9.8); Graphite comes next. Its complementary colour, directly opposite on the colour wheel, is #574F4E — a umber tone that gives the strongest contrast in hue.

Designers tend to use dark tones like #4E5657 for headings, body text, footers and dark-mode backgrounds. Put white text on top of it — 7.52:1, a WCAG AAA pass. Used as a text colour on white, it is readable too (7.52:1).

Colour codes

HEX
RGB
HSL
HSV / HSB
CMYK
CIELAB
Decimal
CSS
Red78
Green86
Blue87

Closest named colours

Charcoal
#36454F · ΔE 9.8
Graphite
#383838 · ΔE 12.8
Umber
#635147 · ΔE 13.5

ΔE measures visible difference: under 2 is barely noticeable, over 10 is clearly different.

Text on #4E5657

WCAG contrast for white and black text on this colour.

White heading text
Body copy set on charcoal #4E5657.
7.52:1AAA
Black heading text
Body copy set on charcoal #4E5657.
2.79:1Fail

Colour-blindness preview

How #4E5657 appears to people with the three most common types of colour-vision deficiency.

Normal vision
#4E5657
Protanopia (no red cones)
#555557
Deuteranopia (no green cones)
#535457
Tritanopia (no blue cones)
#4C5756

Shades, tints & matching colours

Tints and shades

Complementary

Analogous

Triadic

Split complementary

Tetradic

Similar colours

Frequently asked questions

›What colour is #4E5657?

#4E5657 is a near-neutral, dark shade in the gray family. On screen it is built from 31% red, 34% green and 34% blue; for print, its CMYK mix is 10% cyan, 1% magenta, 0% yellow and 66% black. It is close to neutral, so it sits comfortably next to both warm and cool colours.

›What text colour should I use on #4E5657?

Use white text. White on #4E5657 has a contrast ratio of 7.52:1 (AAA).

›What colours go with #4E5657?

Its complementary colour is #574F4E, and analogous partners are #4E5753 and #4E5257.