Tyrian#AF00FF, a vivid violet
Tyrian in RGB, HSL, OKLCH & more
Ready to ship: every line pastes straight into your codebase, and the whole file copies at once.
ART is Rhapsody's perceptual model. How ART works
Why is it called Tyrian?
Tyrian's meaning, origin, and pronunciation, with sources.
Anchor: A61 · one of the 72 anchor hues of ART
Origin: Tyre, the Phoenician port (modern Lebanon)
Meaning: The imperial purple of Tyre, wrung from sea snails
TIH-ree-un · /ˈtɪriən/
Phoenician Ṣūr, "rock" → Greek Týros → Tyre, the port → "Tyrian purple," the dye of emperors → English Tyrian.
The dye came from the mucus of murex sea snails, and the economics beggar belief. Tens of thousands of snails yielded barely enough to trim a single garment. That priced it above gold, kept it under imperial monopoly for centuries, and gave the phrase "born to the purple" its meaning. (The discovery legend, in which Herakles' dog bites a snail and comes back purple-mouthed, is exactly that. A legend.)
When the Byzantine dye works fell in 1453, the cardinals of Rome switched their robes to kermes red, the insect dye behind Crimson, and the snail's reign was over.
Its afterlife has a perfect twist. The word purple itself comes from porphyra, the Greek name for that same snail. And two anchors away sits Mauve, the cheap synthetic purple that finished what 1453 started.
Royal Society, "Perkin's Purple" (snail economics); Wikipedia s.v. Tyrian purple. Etymological dictionaries + scholarly sources. Audio: synthesized (en_US-lessac-medium).
Shades of Tyrian, lighter and darker
For hover states, washed backgrounds, and dark surfaces that still read as #AF00FF. 13 steps, spaced evenly by eye, with the color itself sitting at its natural depth, tyrian-600.
Tints (light surfaces; dark text passes on every one)
Midtones (the color at full strength, for brand & accent work)
Shades (dark surfaces; light text passes on every one)
Most tools mix. Rhapsody measures.
Paste any color. The whole system comes back, contrast-checked before you see it.
The window on the right was generated from #AF00FF, like this whole page.
Is Tyrian accessible? Contrast with white & black
Strong contrast makes your work readable by everyone, and meets the WCAG standard accessibility law points at. AA is the floor; AAA is the tier worth aiming for in body text. White text on #AF00FF passes AA. For AAA, use its scale. Every strip below is one surface, and the marks are the steps that reach AAA on it.
Rows are text, columns are background · 62 of 210 pairings reach WCAG 2.2 AAA, shown here.
Ship the audit, not screenshots.
Run #AF00FF against the colors you actually ship, every pairing and any target, and export it: exact ratios, the AA tier, APCA, in one file.
The audit on the right was calibrated from #AF00FF, like this whole page.
Tyrian in CMYK: one value for files, one per press
This color shifts further than a press run can hold, so expect a visible difference. The pairs below show where each standard lands.
In CMYK, #AF00FF is . That is the value design tools and file formats use when no press is involved.
On press (what each standard prints)
shifts ΔE00 21.6, 8.6× the 2.5 a run varies by
shifts ΔE00 19.7, 7.9× the 2.5 a run varies by
shifts ΔE00 18.7, 7.5× the 2.5 a run varies by
shifts ΔE00 17.3, 6.9× the 2.5 a run varies by
shifts ΔE00 17.0, 6.8× the 2.5 a run varies by
Press values computed through the ICC characterization data each standard proofs against. Each CMYK above is the closest that standard can get.
No surprises at the printer.
Run any color through the major press standards: FOGRA51, GRACoL, Japan Color, FOGRA39. It's coming soon. Create a free account and you'll get a note the moment it's live.
The strip shows this page's tints and shades on screen, then through a standard GRACoL 2013 conversion.
Colors similar to Tyrian
The imperial purple of Tyre, wrung from sea snails
Here are other colors similar to Tyrian along with accessible text pairings and whether or not they're print-safe. Explore The Violets
| Bright Violet | Bright Violet | #AD0AFD | white text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Electric Purple | Electric Purple | #AA23FF | white text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Ube | Ube | #A000FF | white text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Vivid Purple | Vivid Purple | #9900FA | white text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Amethyst | Amethyst | #9100FF | white text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Electric Violet | Electric Violet | #8B00FF | white text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Blue Violet | Blue Violet | #8A2BE2 | white text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Lightish Purple | Lightish Purple | #A552E6 | black text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Sugilite | Sugilite | #8200FF | white text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Lighter Purple | Lighter Purple | #A55AF4 | black text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Purpley | Purpley | #8756E4 | white text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Violet | Violet | #7200FF | white text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Bluish Purple | Bluish Purple | #703BE7 | white text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Light Urple | Light Urple | #B36FF6 | black text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Burple | Burple | #6832E3 | white text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Purply Blue | Purply Blue | #661AEE | white text · AAA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Medium Slate Blue | Medium Slate Blue | #7B68EE | black text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Medium Purple | Medium Purple | #9370DB | black text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Fuchsia Blue | Fuchsia Blue | #7A58C1 | white text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Light Indigo | Light Indigo | #6D5ACF | white text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Slate Blue | Slate Blue | #6A5ACD | white text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Bluey Purple | Bluey Purple | #6241C7 | white text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Purple Heart | Purple Heart | #652DC1 | white text · AAA | ✕ shifts on press |
| True V | True V | #8A73D6 | black text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Studio | Studio | #714AB2 | white text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Purple/Blue | Purple/Blue | #5D21D0 | white text · AAA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Blue Marguerite | Blue Marguerite | #7666C6 | white text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Periwinkle | Periwinkle | #8E82FE | black text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Iris | Iris | #6258C4 | white text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Lavender Blue | Lavender Blue | #8B88F8 | black text · AA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Rebecca Purple | Rebecca Purple | #663399 | white text · AAA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Daisy Bush | Daisy Bush | #4F2398 | white text · AAA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Kingfisher Daisy | Kingfisher Daisy | #3E0480 | white text · AAA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Royal Purple | Royal Purple | #4B006E | white text · AAA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Windsor | Windsor | #3C0878 | white text · AAA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Blue Diamond | Blue Diamond | #380474 | white text · AAA | ✕ shifts on press |
| Christalle | Christalle | #33036B | white text · AAA | ✕ shifts on press |
Colors that go with Tyrian
The complementary color, straight across the wheel, is a brilliant green #8BDD66. Rhapsody's pick is the split complement, just to one side of it, a livelier pair.
The accent is for the moments that need attention, the harmony for the ones that need calm; the neutral carries the text and surfaces in between.
Take Tyrian with you
The work on this page doesn't stay here. Save a card and the color arrives in your file, your deck or your board already decided.
Your system is already built.
Rhapsody built it before you even asked: the scale, the neutrals, the utilities, every pairing calibrated.
This page's whole theme is built from one color. Palette does the same for yours: every step calibrated, every pairing checked, press included.
Every color on this page was calibrated, not mixed.
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