Colors

Palette

This is the primary color palette for all Colorado communications. These are based off of the brandCOLORADO state guidelines, but the blue colors have been lightened or darkened since they are used as the text and background colors for text. This is to meet accessibility requirements. In addition to these primary colors, each state agency can select a set of accent colors from the Accent Palettes.

Primary colors

Accent Palette Earth Tones No. 7

Accent Palette Mid Tones No. 12

Accent Palette Vibrant Tones No. 19

Text accessibility

WCAG (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines) ensure that content is accessible by everyone, regardless of disability or user device. To meet these standards, text and interactive elements should have a color contrast ratio of at least 4.5:1. This ensures that viewers who cannot see the full color spectrum are able to read the text. This color contrast tool is a useful resource for testing the compliance of any color combination.

Please note that many of the colors above cannot work as text. They can be used for design, but if you need to do text there are not that many combinations using the state colors that will work. They need to be lightened or darkened.

Here are examples that do work...

Colors on a white background

Neutrals on a colored background