Pastel Yellow Color Codes

Pastel Yellow is a very light, vivid yellow with the hex code #FDFD96, RGB values of 253, 253, 150 and an HSL value of hsl(60, 96%, 79%).

HEX	#FDFD96
RGB	253, 253, 150
HSL	hsl(60, 96%, 79%)
HSV	60°, 41%, 99%
CMYK	0%, 0%, 41%, 1%
LAB	97.36, -14.32, 49.19
CIELCHuv	97.36, 68.22, 85.87°

Nearest Pantone: PMS 393 C ΔE 4.9 · approximate
Nearest CSS name: khaki ΔE 9.8

Community source color-name-list, community color-name index

Pastel Yellow Color Hex Code

The Pastel Yellow color hex code is #FDFD96. Those six digits are three pairs, FD for red, FD for green and 96 for blue, which is the same triplet a browser reads from the CSS value below.

#FDFD96

Pastel Yellow Color RGB Code

The Pastel Yellow RGB code is rgb(253, 253, 150). Red carries the most light at 253 of 255, which is what puts this color where it sits on the wheel.

rgb(253, 253, 150)

Pastel Yellow Color HSV Code

The Pastel Yellow HSV code is 60°, 41%, 99%. Read it as a hue of 60 degrees, 41% saturation and 99% value, which is the form most color pickers use because moving one number changes one thing.

60°, 41%, 99%

Pastel Yellow Color CIELChuv Code

The Pastel Yellow CIELCHuv code is 97.36, 68.22, 85.87°. Unlike hex or RGB this one is perceptual: lightness 97 means light to the eye rather than to the screen, and chroma 68 is how far it sits from grey.

97.36, 68.22, 85.87°

Tonal scale

What are Pastel Yellow Color Palettes?

A shade mixes toward black, a tint toward white, a tone toward grey. Every step keeps the hue and is copy-ready.

Shades, toward black

Tints, toward white

Tones, toward grey

Open in the shades & tints generator →

Palettes

What are Pastel Yellow Color Palette Codes?

Each of these is a hue rotation from #FDFD96. They are generated, not curated, so they are exact.

Complementary

Directly opposite sits #9696FD, a mid-tone, vivid blue. No other pairing separates two hues further, so this is the one to reach for when a single element has to win attention. Both are saturated, so give the complement much less area than the base or the two will fight.

Analogous

#FDCA96 and #CAFD96 sit 30 degrees either side. All three share most of their hue, so the set reads as one family instead of three separate decisions. Good for backgrounds and for state variations that should not announce themselves.

Triadic

#96FDFD and #FD96FD complete an even 120 degree split. Three fully independent hues, so one has to lead: keep this base dominant and let the other two appear in small quantities.

Split-complementary

Instead of the direct complement, this takes the two hues either side of it: #96CAFD and #CA96FD. Almost the same contrast, without the edge shimmer a true complementary pair produces at high saturation.

Tetradic

Two complementary pairs forming a rectangle: this base with #9696FD, and #96FDCA with #FD96CA. The richest of the five and the hardest to balance, so treat the darkest of the four as the lead and hold the other three well back.

See these on the color wheel →

Accessibility

Measured against white and against black, with a separate verdict for each element type. Small text, large text and UI components have different thresholds, so one pass or fail for the whole color would be wrong roughly a third of the time.

White background

1.07:1

1.07

contrast ratio on white background

Element	AA	AAA
Small text needs 4.5:1 / 7:1	Fails	Fails
Large text needs 3:1 / 4.5:1	Fails	Fails
UI component needs 3:1	Fails	n/a

Black background

19.67:1

19.67

contrast ratio on black background

Element	AA	AAA
Small text needs 4.5:1 / 7:1	Passes	Passes
Large text needs 3:1 / 4.5:1	Passes	Passes
UI component needs 3:1	Passes	n/a

At 1.07:1 against white, Pastel Yellow is a fill color rather than a text color. Use it for surfaces, borders and large display type, and set the copy in ink. Text placed on it should be black, which gives 19.67:1. It is a highly saturated color, so it will dominate anything it sits beside. Give it space rather than surrounding it with other strong colors.

Check Pastel Yellow against another color →

Color vision

How Pastel Yellow looks with color blindness

Around 300 million people see color differently from the way it is specified. Each card shows the actual color beside how it appears, and how common that form of vision is.

Protanopia

About 1% of men

actual

#FDFDB6

Pastel Yellow shifts noticeably here. ΔE 15.5

No working red cones. Reds darken sharply and drift toward the same muddy olive as green.

Deuteranopia

About 1% of men

actual

#FDFDBD

Pastel Yellow shifts noticeably here. ΔE 19.0

No working green cones. With the milder deuteranomaly at nearer 6% of men, this is by far the most common form, and the one worth designing around.

Tritanopia

About 1 in 10,000

actual

#FDCBCF

Pastel Yellow changes substantially here. ΔE 56.3

No working blue cones. Blues shift toward green and yellows toward pink. Rare, and unlike the others it is not sex-linked, so it affects men and women equally.

Achromatopsia

About 1 in 30,000

actual

#F7F7F7

Pastel Yellow changes substantially here. ΔE 51.2

No color vision at all. Also a fair proxy for how the color survives a greyscale print or a failing screen.

To a deuteranope, the most common form, Pastel Yellow reads as #FDFDBD. That is a shift of ΔE 19.0, so it is a different color to roughly one man in sixteen. The widest shift is under tritanopia, at ΔE 56.3. The rule this leads to needs no simulator: never let color be the only thing carrying a message. Add a label, an icon, or a clear difference in lightness, and the problem disappears for everyone.

Simulate a whole palette →

Snippets

Using Pastel Yellow in code

:root {
  --pastel-yellow: #FDFD96;
}

.example {
  color: var(--pastel-yellow);
}

// tailwind.config.js
theme: {
  extend: {
    colors: {
      'pastel-yellow': '#FDFD96',
    },
  },
}

// SwiftUI takes 0–1 components, not 0–255.
let pastelYellow = Color(
    red: 0.992,
    green: 0.992,
    blue: 0.588
)

<!-- res/values/colors.xml -->
<color name="pastel_yellow">#FDFD96</color>

// Flutter wants ARGB: FF for full opacity, then the hex.
const pastelYellow = Color(0xFFFDFD96);

Meaning

What is the Meaning of Pastel Yellow Color?

Pastel Yellow reads as optimism and daylight. It is light enough to sit behind text rather than compete with it, and at 96% saturation with a perceptual lightness of 97 it behaves as a warm color, which is the practical reason it turns up where it does.

What are Other Names of Pastel Yellow Color?

The closest CSS keyword is Khaki (#F0E68C), though it is not a match: Delta-E 9.8 means the difference is visible side by side. For print the nearest Pantone is PMS 393 C at #F2EF87. The name Pastel Yellow comes from the community color-name index rather than a standards body, so you will meet it under other names elsewhere.

How is Pastel Yellow Color Made?

On a screen Pastel Yellow is made by additive light: 253 red, 253 green and 150 blue out of 255, with red leading and 150 as the floor. In print it is subtractive instead, mixed as 0%, 0%, 41%, 1%. Starting from the pure hue at 60 degrees, Pastel Yellow is a tint, so it is that hue with white added.