Mission
What we're trying to build, and why.
Color has names — thousands of them. Crimson, Prussian Blue, Vermillion, Sage, Chartreuse. Each one carries history, psychology, and meaning. Yet finding reliable, consolidated information about a named color has always meant digging through scattered Wikipedia articles, outdated Pantone PDFs, and design forums with contradictory hex values.
Coloripedia fixes that. One URL per color. Every format. The story behind it.
Coloripedia documents 312 named colors drawn from the CSS specification, the X11 color list and widely used historical and colloquial names. For each color we show hex, RGB, HSL and CMYK values computed from its hex code, the nearest RAL and NCS equivalents where a close one exists, and editorial content on its meaning, history and use in design.
Who built this
The person behind the project.
I'm a developer and tool builder with a background in business automation and UI engineering. I previously built ConvertBase.app — a collection of free conversion and calculation tools.
The idea for Coloripedia came from a recurring frustration: when a designer says "use Prussian Blue," a developer needs a hex code, an RGB value, and enough context to understand the intent — but that information is buried across five different websites. Coloripedia is the single source I wanted to exist.
I maintain the color database, curate the editorial content, and build the tooling that keeps the encyclopedia accurate and fast. All tools on the site run in your browser — no data ever leaves your device.
Data sources
Where our color data comes from.
CSS Named Colors
87 of the colors here are CSS named colors (from the 148 in the specification); their hex values match the W3C CSS Color specification exactly.
X11 / Web Colors
The extended X11 color set used in SVG and HTML, cross-referenced with the CSS specification for consistency.
RAL Classic
Nearest RAL Classic equivalents for 198 colors, found by RGB color distance. They are approximations for orientation, not official RAL designations.
Wikipedia color articles
Historical names, etymology, and cultural context draw on Wikipedia's List of Colors and individual color articles.
NCS (Natural Color System)
Nearest NCS equivalents for 155 colors, found the same way as RAL — approximate, not official NCS notations.
For full detail on how we source, verify, and update color data, see our Methodology page.
Our commitments
Privacy first
No search data is collected. Your interactions with tools run entirely in your browser. We use Google Analytics and Umami only for aggregate page-view metrics.
Free, forever
Coloripedia is free to use. No paywalls, no sign-up, no "premium" color data.
Open methodology
We document exactly how color values are sourced and verified. If something is wrong, we want to know — and we fix it publicly.
Zero runtime cost
The site is fully static — no database, no server-side computation. Every page loads from a CDN in milliseconds.
How content is made
Descriptions are drafted with the help of AI language models and curated by the author. Every number on a page — conversions, contrast ratios, scales — is computed from the hex code, not typed by hand.
Accessible by default
Every color page reports real WCAG 2.x contrast ratios against white and black, computed with the W3C relative-luminance formula.
Found an error? Have a suggestion?
We read every message. If a hex value is wrong or a color is missing, let us know.