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Sapphire Shadow Soft
Color detail

Sapphire Shadow Soft

Blue · Hue 210
Metrics
S 34% · L 28%
Contrast (WCAG)
on white9.6:1AAon black2.2:1Fail
Save to journalSign in to saveStart palette from thisRecent trail

About this color

Sapphire Shadow Soft (#2F4760) belongs to the blue family — hue 210°, 34% saturation, 28% lightness. Copy the hex, RGB, or HSL value above, or paste the CSS custom property below into your stylesheet to reference this color directly.

CSS
:root {
  --colorarchive-sapphire-shadow-soft: #2F4760;
  --colorarchive-sapphire-shadow-soft-hsl: hsl(210, 34%, 28%);
  --colorarchive-sapphire-shadow-soft-rgb: rgb(47, 71, 96);
}

AI Color Names

Let AI suggest alternative poetic names for this color in English and Chinese.

Design Context

AuthoritativeIntellectualLuxurious
Common in

Defense · Aviation · Higher Education

Pairs well with

Gold for prestige, white for sharp readability, electric blue for energy

Design tip

Perfect for dark mode backgrounds and headers. Navy is softer than black and adds character. Pair with bright accents for contrast.

Cultural context ▶

Navy and midnight blue symbolize authority, intelligence, and tradition. The color of uniforms, institutions, and power.

Color Origins

Blue family

The most-loved color on the planet, and the most overused.

Heritage

Blue is one of the hardest colors for nature to make with pigment — and, historically, one of the most expensive to paint with. Ultramarine, ground from lapis lazuli mined in Afghanistan, could cost as much as gold in Renaissance Europe; Vermeer used it lavishly. Egyptian blue (the first synthetic pigment, ~3000 BCE) was lost for centuries and rediscovered in the 19th. Prussian blue (1704) quickly gave painters a cheap alternative to ultramarine; Yves Klein's IKB (1960) re-aristocratized blue.

Across cultures

In ancient Egypt blue was the color of the Nile and the heavens — sacred, protective. In China blue-and-white porcelain (qinghua) defined export ceramics for centuries. In Mediterranean traditions blue wards off the evil eye. In America, IBM's blue logo helped earn it the nickname 'Big Blue'; in Japan, indigo (ai) is the centuries-old workwear dye that became the ground tone of an entire textile tradition. Across the world blue is consistently rated the most-liked color — in one ten-country survey it led every other color by 8 to 18 points.

In the wild

Mark Zuckerberg has said Facebook is blue because he is red-green colorblind. Levi's blue is the natural color of indigo on cotton. Twitter Blue (#1DA1F2) defined social-media blue for years before the 2023 rebrand to X scrapped it. The blue checkmark, the blue link, the blue 'send' button — blue has become the default color of digital trust, to the point of being a UX cliché.

How it reads

Blue tends to recede — the eye focuses blue light slightly in front of the retina, which can make blue elements feel deep or distant. It reads as trustworthy, calm, corporate, and (at the cool end) cold. Light blues read airy and clinical; mid blues are the default for tech and finance; deep blues read as luxurious or naval. The omnipresence of blue in software is real: most enterprise UIs reach for it because it offends the fewest stakeholders, which is also the reason it can feel like the absence of a real choice.

This particular tone

A deep, weighted version of the hue — formal, considered, and pairs especially well with off-white and warm metallic accents.

Lightness band: At this depth the hue starts behaving like a neutral — it can substitute for black in many contexts while still carrying a faint chromatic temperature. It pairs especially well with off-whites and warm metallics.

Saturation band: The clear, mid-saturation register is a common identity sweet spot — saturated enough to register as a 'real' color, restrained enough not to fight typography or photography placed over it.

Brands using a similar color

Within the public brand-guidelines reference catalog, these are the closest matches to #2F4760.

  • Airbnbneutral
    Hof Gray · #484848
    →
  • Xiaohongshu 小红书neutral
    Slate Text · #333333
    →
  • JD.com 京东neutral
    Slate · #333333
    →

Cultures using a similar color

From the cultural-palette catalog, these regions feature a color close to #2F4760.

  • IndiaMughal Blue
    #1B4F72 · Indo-Persian miniature paintings
    →
  • China (Traditional)Indigo Blue (青)
    #1A4378 · Persicaria tinctoria — Han textile dye
    →
  • JapanIndigo (ai-iro 藍色)
    #22366E · Persicaria tinctoria fermentation dye
    →

Color guides

Go deeper on using blue and color in design.

HistoryIndigo: The Color That Built Trade Routes and Made Blue CheapBrand & MarketingTechnology Brand Color Design: Trust, Intelligence, and the Blue ProblemColor SystemsDocumenting Color Systems: The Three Layers Every Design System Needs

Tonal strip

All lightness levels at this hue and saturation. Click any to navigate.

Palette moves

Instead of stopping at one swatch, use nearby, opposite, and tonal neighbors to branch into a broader palette.

Lighter companion
Sapphire Dusk Soft
#395774 · hsl(210, 34%, 34%)
Darker companion
Sapphire Nocturne Soft
#223344 · hsl(210, 34%, 20%)
Complementary counterpoint
Coral Shadow Soft
#60472F · hsl(30, 34%, 28%)
Analogous lead
Indigo Shadow Soft
#2F3760 · hsl(230, 34%, 28%)
Analogous echo
Cerulean Shadow Soft
#2F5860 · hsl(190, 34%, 28%)
Triadic +120°
Blush Shadow Soft
#602F47 · hsl(330, 34%, 28%)
Triadic +240°
Lime Shadow Soft
#47602F · hsl(90, 34%, 28%)
Split-comp +150°
Crimson Shadow Soft
#602F2F · hsl(0, 34%, 28%)
Split-comp +210°
Citrine Shadow Soft
#60602F · hsl(60, 34%, 28%)
Export preview
Base: Sapphire Shadow Soft #2F4760
Lighter companion: Sapphire Dusk Soft #395774
Darker companion: Sapphire Nocturne Soft #223344
Complementary counterpoint: Coral Shadow Soft #60472F
Analogous lead: Indigo Shadow Soft #2F3760
Analogous echo: Cerulean Shadow Soft #2F5860
Triadic +120°: Blush Shadow Soft #602F47
Triadic +240°: Lime Shadow Soft #47602F
Split-comp +150°: Crimson Shadow Soft #602F2F
Split-comp +210°: Citrine Shadow Soft #60602F

Compare

See how Sapphire Shadow Soft compares side by side with related colors.

vsSapphire Dusk SoftvsSapphire Nocturne SoftvsCoral Shadow SoftvsIndigo Shadow SoftvsCerulean Shadow SoftvsBlush Shadow Soft

Nearest neighbors

The closest archive matches by hue, saturation, and lightness.

Search by hex
Nearby match
Sapphire Shadow Dust
#35475A · hsl(210, 26%, 28%)
Nearby match
Sapphire Dusk Soft
#395774 · hsl(210, 34%, 34%)
Nearby match
Steel Shadow Soft
#2F4B60 · hsl(205, 34%, 28%)
Nearby match
Sapphire Nocturne Soft
#223344 · hsl(210, 34%, 20%)
Nearby match
Sapphire Shadow Muted
#3B4754 · hsl(210, 18%, 28%)
Nearby match
Sapphire Dusk Dust
#40576D · hsl(210, 26%, 34%)

Accessible pairings

Archive colors that meet WCAG contrast standards when paired with this color. Use as text-on-background or background-on-text.

Contrast checker
AAA9.2:1
Coral Veil Faint
#FAFAF9
AAA9.2:1
Coral Veil Muted
#FBFAF9
AAA9.2:1
Coral Veil Dust
#FBFAF9
AAA9.2:1
Coral Veil Soft
#FCFAF8
AAA9.2:1
Coral Veil Clear
#FDFAF7
AAA9.2:1
Coral Veil Vivid
#FEFAF6

Color Vision Simulation

How this color appears with different color vision deficiencies.

Full simulator
Deuteranopia
#393759
Protanopia
#3B3B5B
Tritanopia
#315655
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Saturation ladder

Same hue and lightness, from gray to pure

Search
Cool Gray Shadow#43474C · hsl(210, 6%, 28%)Sapphire Shadow Faint#40474F · hsl(210, 10%, 28%)Sapphire Shadow Muted#3B4754 · hsl(210, 18%, 28%)Sapphire Shadow Dust#35475A · hsl(210, 26%, 28%)Sapphire Shadow Soft#2F4760 · hsl(210, 34%, 28%)Sapphire Shadow Clear#21476E · hsl(210, 54%, 28%)Sapphire Shadow Vivid#13477C · hsl(210, 74%, 28%)Sapphire Shadow Bright#0B4783 · hsl(210, 84%, 28%)Sapphire Shadow Pure#064789 · hsl(210, 92%, 28%)
More from Blue →
Appears in collections
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