Dark Gray (#a9a9a9) is a light, grayish gray. It is a CSS named color, so you can use it in stylesheets as color: darkgray as well as by its hex code. In RGB it is rgb(169, 169, 169); in HSL, hsl(0, 0%, 66%).
| Hex | #a9a9a9 |
|---|---|
| CSS name | darkgray (alias: darkgrey) |
| RGB | rgb(169, 169, 169) |
| HSL | hsl(0, 0%, 66%) |
| CMYK | 0%, 0%, 0%, 34% |
| CSS example | color: #a9a9a9; background-color: rgb(169, 169, 169); |
The hue is calculated at seven exact lightness levels for use in backgrounds, borders, text and hover states. These values are not substituted with nearby named colors.
#a9a9a9 is a neutral: it carries little to no hue, so wheel-based schemes like complementary or triadic would simply return the same gray. Neutrals work differently — use the ramp above for backgrounds, borders and text, and pair #a9a9a9 with a saturated accent for links, buttons and highlights. Each of these accents reads clearly against #a9a9a9:
On a #a9a9a9 background, black text gives the better contrast. WCAG requires 4.5:1 for normal text and 3:1 for large text (AA), or 7:1 and 4.5:1 for AAA.
| Text color | Contrast ratio | Normal text | Large text |
|---|---|---|---|
| White text (#ffffff) | 2.35:1 | Fails | Fails |
| Black text (#000000) | 8.94:1 | AAA | AAA |
The CSS named colors closest to #a9a9a9:
Turn #a9a9a9 into a full scheme with the Color Palette Generator, blend it into a background with the CSS Gradient Generator, or browse all named colors.