Primary colors
The colors you mix to make all the others: red, green and blue for light; cyan, magenta and yellow for ink.
Also called primary color, primaries
Primary colors are the starting points of a color system. For light (screens) they are red, green and blue; for printing inks, cyan, magenta and yellow.
The traditional painter’s primaries, red, yellow and blue, come from mixing pigments and are still used on the classic artist’s color wheel.
Guides that cover Primary colors
- Harmony What Is Color Harmony? Color harmony explained: complementary, analogous, triadic and other harmonies, and how balanced color relationships make a design feel right. Read on.
- Mixing Additive vs Subtractive Color Additive vs subtractive color explained: how RGB light adds up to white, how CMYK ink subtracts toward black, and why screens and print differ. Read on.
- Palettes What Is a Color Palette? What is a color palette? Learn the main palette types, how many colors to use and how to build one for your brand or website. Then try our palette tools.
- Color Wheel Primary, Secondary, and Tertiary Colors Explained Primary, secondary and tertiary colors explained across RYB, RGB and CMYK, with how each one is mixed on the color wheel. Learn the basics in 5 minutes.
- Pantone What Are Pantone Colors? Learn what Pantone colors are, how the Pantone Matching System and color codes work, and how Pantone compares to CMYK, RGB and HEX for print. Read on.
- RGB What are RGB colors? RGB color explained: how red, green and blue - 255 values make every color on screen, how to read an RGB color code, RGB vs HEX, and RGBA. Learn it fast.