Adobe Spectrum Color Palette — Accessibility & Quality Audit
Adobe Spectrum ships 10 color ramps with 18 shades each. Chromametry scores it 88.59 / 100, ranking #1 of 11 design systems in the palette benchmark.
Open Adobe Spectrum in the Palette Generator →
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Is the Adobe Spectrum palette WCAG accessible?
Any two Adobe Spectrum shades that are at least 9 steps apart reach 4.5:1 contrast in every ramp — that is the palette's contrast span (K). Pick text and background 9 or more steps apart and you never need to check a pair by hand.
| Contrast target | Used for | Steps apart needed (K) |
|---|---|---|
| 3:1 | large text, icons, UI borders (WCAG AA) | 7 of 17 |
| 4.5:1 | body text (WCAG AA) | 9 of 17 |
| 7:1 | body text (WCAG AAA) | 11 of 17 |
Quality metrics
Each metric is 0–1 (higher is better); the composite score is their geometric mean × 100.
| Metric | Adobe Spectrum | What it measures |
|---|---|---|
| Contrast efficiency | 0.943 | how much of the ramp the WCAG contrast span consumes |
| Lightness linearity | 0.933 | whether perceived lightness steps evenly |
| Chroma smoothness | 0.879 | whether saturation changes without kinks |
| Hue stability | 0.914 | whether each ramp keeps its hue from light to dark |
| Spacing uniformity | 0.772 | whether adjacent shades are equally distinct (CIEDE2000) |
All 10 ramps
blue
#ffffff · #f5f9ff · #e5f0fe · #cbe2fe · #accffd · #8eb9fc · #729efd · #5d89ff · #4b75ff · #3b63fb · #274dea · #1d3ecf · #1532ad · #10288c · #0c1f69 · #0e1843 · #070b1e · #000000
red
#ffffff · #fff6f5 · #ffebe8 · #ffd6d1 · #ffbcb4 · #ff9d91 · #ff7665 · #ff513d · #f03823 · #d73220 · #b72818 · #9c2113 · #811b0e · #68150a · #501006 · #3b0b04 · #1d0502 · #000000
orange
#ffffff · #fff6e7 · #ffeccf · #ffda9e · #ffc15e · #ffa213 · #fc7d00 · #e86a00 · #d45b00 · #c24e00 · #a73e00 · #903300 · #762900 · #5f2000 · #491800 · #341200 · #190800 · #000000
yellow
#ffffff · #fff8cc · #fff197 · #ffde2c · #f5c700 · #e6af00 · #d29500 · #c18300 · #af7400 · #9e6600 · #865500 · #724800 · #5d3b00 · #4b2f00 · #382300 · #281900 · #120b00 · #000000
green
#ffffff · #edfcf1 · #d7f7e1 · #adeec5 · #6be3a2 · #2bd17d · #12b867 · #0ba45d · #079355 · #05834e · #036e45 · #025d3c · #014c34 · #003d2c · #002e22 · #002119 · #000f0c · #000000
cyan
#ffffff · #eefafe · #d9f4fd · #b7e7fc · #8ad5ff · #5cc0ff · #30a7fe · #1d95e7 · #1286cd · #0b78b3 · #046691 · #005779 · #004762 · #00394e · #002b3b · #001f2b · #000e14 · #000000
purple
#ffffff · #fbf7fe · #f4ebfc · #ebdaf9 · #ddc1f6 · #d0a7f3 · #bf8aee · #b272eb · #a65ce7 · #9a47e2 · #8628d9 · #730dcc · #5d00b1 · #4b0090 · #3b006f · #2c0054 · #17002d · #000000
pink
#ffffff · #fff6fc · #ffe8f7 · #ffd3f0 · #ffb5e6 · #ff94db · #ff67cc · #f24cb8 · #e434a3 · #ce2a92 · #b01f7b · #981668 · #800c55 · #690344 · #530035 · #3e0027 · #210015 · #000000
brown
#ffffff · #fcf7f2 · #f7eee1 · #efddc3 · #e5c89d · #d6b17b · #be9b68 · #ab8a5a · #9a7b4d · #8b6d42 · #775b32 · #674c23 · #583d15 · #463111 · #34250d · #261a09 · #100c04 · #000000
silver
#ffffff · #f7f7f7 · #efefef · #dfdfdf · #cccccc · #b7b7b7 · #a0a0a0 · #8f8f8f · #808080 · #727272 · #606060 · #515151 · #424242 · #343434 · #272727 · #1c1c1c · #0c0c0c · #000000
How Adobe Spectrum compares
Adobe Spectrum has the highest score of all 11 design systems benchmarked.
Other audits: IBM Carbon · U.S. Web Design System · Salesforce Lightning 2 · GitHub Primer · Atlassian · Tailwind CSS · Ant Design · Material UI v4 · Radix UI · Shopify Polaris — or see the full ranking.
Want a palette that scores higher? The Palette Generator builds ramps from any base color with even perceptual steps and a short contrast span.