Yellow Color Codes
The color code of Yellow is Hex #FFFF00, RGB rgb(255, 255, 0), HSL hsl(60, 100%, 50%) and HSB 60°, 100%, 100%. Yellow is an additive secondary. It is red and green light at full strength with no blue, so it is a mix rather than a primary. There are more yellow shades than any one list can hold. The 25 named below each come with a full code set you can copy for design and color grading work.
The family
Different Shades of Yellow
There are 25 named shades of yellow here. Each one links to its own page with the full code set. Click any swatch to copy its hex.
What Is the Color Code for Yellow?
The Yellow color code has four screen formats and one print format. The screen ones are Hex, RGB, HSL and HSB. The print one is CMYK. All five describe the same yellow. They differ in what they make easy to change.
What Is the Hex Code for Yellow?
The hex code for Yellow is #FFFF00. Hex is the format you use in CSS and in most design tools. The first two digits set red, the next two set green and the last two set blue. In #FFFF00 the red pair is highest at FF and the blue pair is lowest at 00.
What Is the RGB Code for Yellow?
The RGB code for Yellow is rgb(255, 255, 0). RGB counts each channel from 0 to 255. The gap between the strongest and the weakest channel is 255, and that gap is the whole of the color. Close the gap and you get grey.
What Is the HSL / HSB Code for Yellow?
The HSL code for Yellow is hsl(60, 100%, 50%) and the HSB code is 60°, 100%, 100%. The hue of 60 degrees is the position on the color wheel, and this family runs from 45°–70°. HSL and HSB are easier to adjust by hand than hex. Move the first number and you change the color. Move the others and you keep the color but change how strong or how light it is.
What Is the CMYK Code for Yellow?
The CMYK code for Yellow is 0%, 0%, 100%, 0%. CMYK is for print rather than screens. A screen adds light to make color. Ink takes light away. A yellow this strong is one of the colors that suffers most in the move, because ink cannot reach the brightness a backlit screen can. Ask a printer for a Pantone reference on anything that has to match exactly.
What Does the Color Yellow Mean?
Yellow is the attention color. Taxis, school buses, hazard tape and warning signs use it because it stays visible in poor light and against most backgrounds. It carries optimism and cheapness at the same time. Which one lands depends almost entirely on what sits next to it. How much of that a shade carries depends on how strong it is. Yellow Orange holds the most chroma here at 111. Cornsilk holds the least at 22, and reads as barely tinted by comparison.
Lightest & Darkest Shades of Yellow
The lightest shade of yellow is Lemon Yellow at #FFFF9F. The darkest is Brass at #B5A642. Everything else on this page sits between those two. If you need a background, start from the light end. If you need text, start from the dark end.
Which Yellow Is Best for Branding & Design?
It depends what the color has to do. A logo can use any shade here, because a logo does not have to pass a contrast test. A button does, and none of the 25 shades on this page is dark enough to carry white text at the AA standard. That single fact decides most of what follows.
Which Yellow Looks Most Professional for Designs?
None of them on its own. Every shade of yellow here is too light to carry text, so a professional result comes from pairing one with a dark neutral rather than from choosing between them. Brass is the deepest available at lightness 68, and even that needs black text on it.
Which Yellow Shade Increases Attention the Most?
Yellow Orange at #FF9505 draws the most attention. It carries the highest chroma of any shade here at 111, which is the measure of how far a color sits from grey, and that is what makes it hard to ignore. White text on it only reaches 2.20:1, so use it for the thing you want noticed and not for the thing you want read.
Which Yellow Should I Use for a Buy / CTA Button?
None of them with white text on it. Not one shade on this page reaches the 4.5:1 that AA asks for against white, so a white label will fail an audit whichever yellow you pick. Put dark text on it instead, or keep yellow for the surface and give the button a darker color.
Yellow color tools
Convert Yellow Color Codes (Hex, RGB, HSL)
Have a yellow value in one format and need it in another? Paste #FFFF00 in and you get rgb(255, 255, 0) back, and the result updates as you type. These three cover the jobs that come up most.
#FFFF00→rgb(255, 255, 0)
Hex to RGB
Paste a hex, get the three channels
255, 255, 0→#FFFF00
RGB to Hex
Go the other way for CSS
#FFFF00→hsl(60, 100%, 50%)
Hex to HSL
For adjusting a shade by hand
Find the Yellow Hex Code in Any Image
Upload an image and click the part you want. The picker reads that exact pixel, which saves guessing at a yellow in signage or a warning label.
#FF9505
Image Color Picker
Click any pixel in a photo to read its hex
Yellow Orange
Color Name Finder
Give it a value, get the closest named yellow
Build a Yellow Color Palette
Start from #FFFF00, or from any of the 25 shades above. The palette tool pulls colors out of an image. The gradient tool blends two values into a run, and #FFFF9F to #B5A642 covers this family end to end. The shades and tints tool takes one value and gives you a full scale from it.