Color Palette Generator
Generate random palettes, lock colors, adjust HSL, and extract colors from images.
Press Spacebar to generate a new palette. Click a hex code to copy it.
This tool is for informational and educational purposes only. It is not a substitute for professional financial, medical, legal, or engineering advice. See Terms of Service.
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Request a ToolHow to Use the Color Palette Generator
This tool helps you create, explore, and refine color palettes for design projects, websites, illustrations, and more. Everything runs in your browser with no signups or data sent to servers.
- Generate a palette. Click "Generate Palette" or press the spacebar to create a new random 5-color palette. Each color shows its hex code, a large swatch, and HSL sliders.
- Lock colors you like. Click the lock icon on any color to keep it when generating new palettes. Locked colors stay in place while the others change.
- Fine-tune with HSL sliders. Adjust the hue, saturation, and lightness of any color using the sliders below each swatch. Changes update the swatch and hex code in real time.
- Copy hex codes. Click any hex code to copy it to your clipboard for use in CSS, design tools, or anywhere else.
- Use harmony modes. Select a harmony mode (analogous, complementary, triadic, or split-complementary) before generating to create palettes based on color theory relationships.
- Extract from an image. Upload any image to automatically extract its 5 most dominant colors. Great for pulling brand colors from logos or matching a photo's mood.
About Color Palettes
A color palette is a set of colors chosen to work together visually. Designers use palettes to maintain consistency across websites, apps, print materials, and illustrations. Color theory provides several approaches for selecting harmonious colors. Analogous palettes use colors near each other on the color wheel for a cohesive feel. Complementary palettes pair opposite colors for high contrast. Triadic palettes space colors evenly around the wheel for balanced variety. Understanding these relationships helps you pick colors that feel intentional rather than random.
Frequently Asked Questions
How does the image color extraction work?
When you upload an image, the tool draws it to a hidden canvas, samples thousands of pixels, and uses a median-cut quantization algorithm to group similar colors and find the 5 most dominant ones. The process runs entirely in your browser. Your image is never uploaded to any server.
What are the harmony modes?
Harmony modes generate palettes based on color theory. Analogous uses colors close together on the color wheel. Complementary uses colors on opposite sides. Triadic picks three colors evenly spaced at 120 degrees apart. Split-complementary is like complementary but uses the two colors adjacent to the opposite, creating a softer contrast.
Can I share a palette with someone?
Yes. The URL updates automatically as you adjust colors. Copy the URL from your browser's address bar and share it. Anyone who opens that link will see the exact same palette, including which colors are locked.
What does locking a color do?
Locking a color pins it in place. When you generate a new palette, locked colors stay exactly as they are while the unlocked colors get replaced with new ones. This is useful when you find one or two colors you love and want to explore combinations around them.