Color impacts both how attracted users feel toward your website design and what actions they will or won’t take on your site. Want more proof? Consider, for example, the iconic story of Google testing 41 shades of blue, which ultimately increased ad revenue by $200M.
The stakes are clear: choosing strategic color palettes for your web designs is crucial to lasting success. Read on to learn how to choose the right color scheme for your website.
How to choose your website color scheme
When choosing a color palette, designers should balance the esoteric (mood, evolving trends, gut instinct) and more tangible approaches like established brand guidelines, color theory, accessibility standards, and user testing.
1. Aim to evoke a mood
Web design is an art and a science, but in a world where ultra-granular testing is not only possible but rapidly becoming the norm for even smaller organizations, it’s easy to forget the “art” part. Designers should always check the science against their intuition. If a color scheme isn’t creating the right vibe, that might be a clue that something is off.
Similarly, the mood of the site should align with the brand identity: If a web design project is for an established brand, the color scheme should be guided by the existing brand guidelines that were developed specifically to resonate with its target audience.
2. Don’t forget the basics
The color wheel, created by Sir Isaac Newton in the 1600s, is an incredibly useful visual guide to color theory, or the science behind how we process color and which color combinations work best. It breaks color combinations into categories you can use to define your palette, such as:
Analogous: Colors are adjacent to each other on the color wheel.
Square tetradic: Four colors are evenly spaced around the color wheel.
Triadic: Three colors are evenly spaced around the color wheel.
3. Consider accessibility and alternative display types
One important factor in choosing colors for your website is ensuring the color combinations are high contrast so that they can easily be read by people with disabilities, according to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. Two colors on top of one another should have a contrast ratio of 3:1. You can check if your design meets the standards using an online accessibility tracker.
Another factor to consider is how your colors will look in dark mode. Because it’s easier on the eyes, a significant percentage of mobile users display their browsers in dark mode.
4. Test your color scheme
If you’re unsure if your color schemes are working, the best way to find out is through testing with users. Try setting up A/B tests to publish two simultaneous versions of your site and gather data on user interaction on each version.
15 Website color schemes to shape your design
Color trends in website design are constantly changing, so it’s a good idea to check out what other designers are creating to spark inspiration. These 15 website color schemes are intriguing, while still firmly rooted in color theory.
1. Juicy color pop: Feastie
Type: Double split complementary
Purple Grape: #4f227c | Fig: #ffaaf1 | Green Grape: #d2e796 | Blueberry: #3330af | Carrot: #fb580d | Banana: #f7dd54
Don’t be fooled by the six-color palette—this combo is still double split complementary, just with two different purples. The result is a rainbow of juicy, vibrant colors that fit with an event that’s as much about the vibe as it is about the food. This type of controlled chaos in a color palette is great for a food and beverage event like Feastie. Plus, the alternating selection of full saturation with lighter values is good for accessibility standards.
2. Watermelon: Tellet
Type: Complementary
Dark Green: #042a1d | Medium Green: #096846 | Bright Green: #c0ffca | Dark Pink: #943d56 | Bright Pink: #ff6f98| Pastel Pink: #ffd1dc
This example from AI platform Tellet illustrates how even with a two-color primary palette, adding variations can add significant depth. In nature, no color occurs as one flat hue, and when designers create palettes that mirror real life, their products feel more alive than those that feature a flat expanse of color.
3. Modern neon: Thirsty Dumpling
Type: Complementary
Digital Blue :#4B4EEE | Neon Green: #e1f53a
In contrast to the Watermelon palette, Thirsty Dumpling’s two-toned complementary combination is loyal to its primary shades with little variation: a neon green and a blue that feels distinctly digital. While neon green and bright blue are a pair that seem synonymous with the early internet (think: early RGB colorspace), when applied to a food brand, it feels modern and eye-catching.
4. Warm tones: Charis Framer Template
Type: Analogous
Chocolate: #521807 | Redwood: #71220b | Caramel: #bb3c0d | Mustard: #fece66
Perhaps one of the simplest ways to please the eye is to draw up an analogous color palette. In the Charis Framer template, warm browns sit nicely with a creamy mustard yellow. The harmony draws the eye in, and the contrasting values—a deep brown against a lighter yellow—ensure the warm tones blend when you want them to and pop when you don’t.
5. Pop of gold: Civitas Framer Template
Type: Analogous
Deep teal: #163133 | Light teal: #3c767a | Gold: #b1915a | Yellow: #fad28c
Although it may not appear to be analogous at first, this palette featuring various teals and yellow-golds focuses solely on the blue/yellow/green area of the color wheel. Playing up and down the values and saturation gives the palette a significant amount of dimension, leading to a mature and varied palette fit for a professional or academic venture. Framer’s Civitas template’s serif typeface and simple design lend a hand.
6. Shades of pink: Bloom Framer Template
Type: Monochromatic
Deep Rose: #3d0000 | Mauve: #7d6161 | Rosy Pink: #ffe0e0
One color contains the multitudes to create an entire palette. In the Bloom Framer template, pink runs the gamut from a deep rose to a light pastel shade, providing a contemplative mood and sufficient contrast for excellent legibility.
7. Blue: Perplexity
Type: Monochromatic
Deep green: #091717 | Olive: #77774d | Khaki: #e4e3d4
Similar to the monochromatic pink palette above, this example from AI platform Perplexity features several different shades of blue. The solid lighter blue combined with a gradient from light to dark in the background has a layering effect—the solid color feels like it’s on a completely different plane.
8. Warm gray tones: Nestell Framer Template
Type: Monochromatic
Warm black: #15120e | Warm gray: #443d31 | Warm light gray: #ddd8d0
The fastest way to make your site feel ultra-minimal? Use background colors as your main colors. In Framer’s Nestell template, a rainbow of warm grays displays just how versatile gray really is. Shades with slightly different values, like the warm black and warm gray shown here, can feel elegant, subdued, and like a big exhale in an overstimulating world.
9. Cotton candy pastels: Atlas Studio Framer Template
Type: Square tetradic
Lilac: #f8d1ff | Creamsicle: #ffe6d1 | Lime: #f4ffd1 | Sky: #d1f8ff
Four tetradic pastels combine to make a gradient that feels heavenly—or at least like a swirl of cotton candy on a summer day in Framer’s Atlas Studio Template. This light and airy combo is ideal for an agency’s portfolio, dropping to the background to display current projects while still adding a steady drumbeat of personality on every page. Worth noting: It wouldn’t work without the strong black typography as a counterpoint, and flooding the footer.
10. Shades of blue: Fizens Framer Template
Type: Monochromatic
Cobalt: #0040c1 | Cyan: #2970ff | Dusty blue: #d1e0ff
Three different shades of blue each do their part to make this color palette feel complete and dimensional. The color of balance, blue, is a smart choice for a financial brand, like shown in this example of a Framer’s Fizens template, and works well contrasted with a white background and simple black typography.
11. Campus complementary: Juricore Framer Template
Type: Split complementary
Royal blue: #1f4993 | Forest green: #434631 | Burnt orange: #e19132
This split complementary trio of dusky blue, green, and orange in Framer’s Juricore Template feels like a range of smartly bound hardcover books in a collegiate library. The colors are at once serious and youthful, offering a range of both hue and saturation (the orange is light enough to pop out from the blue and the green) that add up to a pleasing palette. Perfect for a brand that takes itself just a little seriously, this color group adds a sense of authority and congenial expertise overall.
12. After dark: Galao Framer Template
Type: Analogous
Aubergine: #451930 | Deep Sage: #374a34 | Gunmetal: #202633 | Digital green: #f0ff8b
Like the Warm Tones palette, After Dark’s strategy is to choose analogous colors, give two or three a similar value, and bring one or two up to bright to act as accent colors. The result is a template—in this case Framer’s Galao—that is just a little off-beat while also displaying an air of sophistication. Great for a brand displaying thought leadership, like an innovative tech company or heady blog, this palette combines the cerebral with the unexpected.
13. Sushi roll: Bambzi Framer Template
Type: Side complementary
Seaweed: #0f1a1a | Sushi salmon: #dd5903 | Steam: #dedede | Rice: #f1ede3
This sophisticated yet inviting palette moves seamlessly from deep, serious green to a strong orange and also includes sophisticated, soft grays. Framer’s Bambzi template color palette is warm, inviting, but still subdued—an excellent fit for a dining establishment, bar, or upscale event.
14. Scout summer: Suntrail Framer Template
Type: Split complementary
Eraser pink: #e2514e | Pencil yellow: #ffbe58 | Pack green: #858b3c
This split complementary palette, used in Framer’s Suntrail template, recalls the childhood month of August: summer is still in full swing, but school with its requisite supply shopping is just around the corner. The yellow and pink feel plucked from a freshly sharpened pencil in a military-green pack leftover from summer scout camp. This combo works great for kids’ content, anything related to summer, or a project that’s nostalgic for simpler times.
15. Purple plays: Syntho Framer Template
Type: Analogous
Brilliant lilac: #5e36ff | Graph paper: #2643ff | Lavender: #d9d9ff
Like a blueprint or complex web of equations worked out atop graph paper, the purple-blue palette in Framer’s Syntho template is both digitized and familiar. These highly pigmented colors feel like digital ink, mapping the way to a new and more interconnected world. Used here for diagrams and charts, the combo feels youthful, energetic, and bold.
Build your site’s color scheme in Framer
Set your site up for success by thoughtfully choosing a color scheme. Ready to explore more professionally-designed templates and existing websites for inspiration? Explore the latest examples in the Framer Gallery and kickstart your project with our professionally-designed templates. You can also use Framer plugins like Palette Pro to generate, browse, and save hex codes and custom color palettes. Plus, you can check out your color palettes in both day and night mode within the plugin.
