---
title: "Colour toolkit"
package: "@phaser-ae/color"
tier: Free
version: 3.0.0-3
released: 2026-10-14
updated: 2026-10-20
description: "Colour as data for any game, building, blending and shifting hex colours, generating rainbows, ramps and gradients, and choosing label colours that stay readable."
url: https://phaser.io/packs/color
site: Phaser - https://phaser.io
---

# Colour toolkit

Colour as data on `game.color`. Hex strings in, hex strings out, which is exactly the form a tint takes, so a team
colour, a damage flash, a rainbow trail or a label that stays readable on its tile is one call rather than hand-rolled
arithmetic.

## What it does

Everything works on the hex strings the engine already uses for tints, in `#rgb`, `#rgba`, `#rrggbb` or `#rrggbbaa`
form, so a result can be assigned straight to an object. `hsv` builds a colour from a hue in degrees and a saturation
and value; `shift` rotates a hue, `brighten` lightens or darkens, `withAlpha` adds transparency, and `lerp` and
`sample` blend between two colours or along a gradient of many. For whole palettes, `rainbow` spaces hues evenly so
they loop, `ramp` walks from one hue to another, `gradient` blends between two colours, and `wheel` gives a colour
wheel at a fixed saturation and value.

It also settles which colour to write on which. `luminance` is the relative brightness an eye perceives, not the
average of the channels, so pure green correctly reads far brighter than pure blue; `contrast` is the standard
accessibility ratio from 1 to 21, and `readableOn` picks whichever ink contrasts best with a background, black or
white by default or a pair you supply. Choosing that by eye is how a palette ships with one unreadable tile.

A malformed hex throws rather than quietly becoming white, so a typo shows up at once. There is no state, no renderer
and nothing to configure, and 2D and 3D games use it alike.

## Features

- **Hex in, hex out** — `parse` to components, `rgb` back to hex, and `pack` for the engine's packed integer.
- **HSV** — `hsv`, `toHsv`, `shift` for hue rotation and `brighten` for lighter or darker.
- **Blending** — `lerp` between two colours and `sample` along a multi-stop gradient.
- **Palettes** — `rainbow`, `ramp`, `gradient` and `wheel`, at a saturation and value you choose.
- **Named life ramps** — eight bright-to-dark ramps, `fire`, `spark`, `ember`, `smoke`, `ice`, `magic`, `toxic` and
  `rainbow`, for particles, trails and anything that cools or fades.
- **Legibility** — `luminance`, `contrast` and `readableOn` for labels written on colour.
- **Loud errors** — a mistyped colour throws instead of hiding.

## Good for

- **Team and player colours** — `rainbow(4)` gives four evenly spaced hues, softened with a lower saturation.
- **Damage flashes and health tints** — `lerp` from white to red by how hurt a character is.
- **Day and night skies** — `sample` a gradient of night, dawn and day by the time of day.
- **Puzzle tiles and badges** — numbers on coloured tiles in the ink that reads best on each.
- **Rainbow trails and colour cycling** — hues that come back round to the first without a jump.
- **Generated palettes** — complementary colours with `shift`, shadows with `brighten`.

## Make it yours

There are no options; the choices are in the calls. Palettes take a saturation and value, so the same `rainbow` can
give vivid arcade colours or soft pastels. `readableOn` takes your own pair of inks, so a game with a warm palette
can choose between a warm dark and a warm light and still have the more readable one picked for it. A puzzle game
might generate a tile palette with `gradient` and label it with `readableOn`; an action game might flash `lerp` tints
on hits and drive trails from the `fire` ramp.

## A quick look

A palette, a tint, a blend and a readable label:

```ts
const { hsv, rainbow, gradient, lerp, shift, sample, readableOn } = game.color;
h.tint = hsv(200, 0.8, 1);                              // hue degrees, saturation, value
const team = rainbow(4, { saturation: 0.7 });
const fire = gradient('#ffffc0', '#ff2000', 12);
h.tint = lerp('#ffffff', '#ff4040', hurt);
const sky = sample(['#0a0a2a', '#ff8040', '#ffe080'], timeOfDay);
const ink = readableOn(tile.tint);                      // black or white, whichever reads
```

## Works with

- `core-2d`, `core-3d` and `core-vector` — all include it, so most games have it already.
- `tween` — requires it, so a tint can tween in RGB.
- `lighting-2d` and the `backdrop-*` packs — take the same hex strings.

## Good to know

- Every call parses its inputs, so cache palettes rather than rebuilding them per object per frame.
- Blends are in RGB, not a perceptual space, so a grey appears midway between complementary colours.
- `lerp` drops alpha; add it back with `withAlpha`. Contrast judges colours as given, so blend a translucent ink
  first.
- Named CSS colours such as `red` are not accepted.
- `readableOn` returns the best of the inks it is given, which may still be too faint; check `contrast` against 3
  or 4.5 when it matters.

---

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