How to Generate a Color Palette From a Base Color

What the color palette generator does

A color palette generator helps you build a coordinated set of colors from one starting color. Choose a palette relationship such as monochromatic, complementary, or analogous when you want a predictable design direction. The random option can help you explore alternatives when you are still deciding on a visual style.

You provide a base color, select a palette type, and request a number of colors. If you leave an input out, the generator uses a blue default color, the monochromatic palette type, and a count of 5.

How to generate a color palette

Enter a hexadecimal base color. You can include the leading #; if you omit it, the generator adds one. A three-digit hexadecimal color is expanded before it is processed.
Select one of the supported palette types: monochromatic, complementary, analogous, or random. Monochromatic keeps the palette within one color family, while complementary and analogous provide different color relationships. Random uses generated hue, saturation, and lightness choices, so results can differ between calls.
Enter the number of colors you want. The requested count is converted to an integer. Values are constrained to the range from 3 through 12, and a value that cannot be converted falls back to 5.
Run the generator and review the returned palette. For a recognized palette type and a valid normalized count, the result contains that number of colors.
If the tool returns an error indication, check the base color and palette type before trying again. A base color that cannot be parsed does not produce generated colors, and an unrecognized palette type also returns an error indication.

How to read the result

Generated colors are presented as lowercase, six-digit hexadecimal values with a leading #. The color channels are rounded to integer values and kept within the 0 through 255 range, giving you values that can be copied into a design workflow.

The selected palette type affects how the colors relate to the base color. Monochromatic, complementary, and analogous palettes use the selected color as their starting point. Random palettes are exploratory rather than repeatable: repeated calls can return different colors because the generator uses random choices for hue, saturation, and lightness.

Treat the requested count as a target within the supported range, not as a way to request fewer than 3 or more than 12 colors. Also check the input whenever a result is an error indication. The tool does not turn an invalid base color or unknown palette type into a successful palette.

Worked example

A designer wants four related blue-toned colors for a small interface and starts with #336699.

Enter #336699, choose analogous, set the requested count to 4, and run the generator.

The result is a list of 4 lowercase six-digit hexadecimal color values, each beginning with #.

Limitations

Counts are constrained to 3 through 12, and an invalid base color or unrecognized palette type returns an error indication instead of generated colors.

Common errors

Using a malformed hexadecimal base color causes an error indication. Correct the color to a parseable hexadecimal value, with or without its leading #, then run the generator again.

FAQ

What happens when I leave the inputs blank?

If you omit the base color, palette type, and count, the generator uses #3498db, monochromatic, and 5 colors.

How many colors can I request?

If the requested count is below 3 or above 12, it is constrained to that supported range. If the value cannot be converted to an integer, the count falls back to 5.

Will a random palette be the same every time?

If you choose random, repeated calls can produce different colors because hue, saturation, and lightness are selected with a random number generator.