Extract a Colour Palette
Pull the dominant colours out of a photograph and get them as something you can use: CSS custom properties, SCSS variables, JSON, a plain hex list, or a labelled palette strip you can paste into a document. The colours come from a median-cut quantiser, so you get genuinely distinct shades rather than six variations of the same blue. Click any swatch to copy it. Nothing is uploaded.
Drop images here
JPG / PNG / WebP · multiple allowed · each gets its own palette
How to extract a palette from an image
- Drop in one or more images.
- Choose how many colours you want — 6 to 8 for a design palette.
- Click Extract palette. Swatches appear per file (click any to copy its hex), the export box fills with code, and a labelled strip PNG is offered for download.
- Switch the export format at any time; the box updates without re-extracting.
Turning extracted colours into a usable scheme
A quantiser tells you what is in the image, which is not the same as a good palette. Photographs are dominated by their largest areas — sky, skin, foliage — so the raw output tends to be several muted mid-tones. Two adjustments make it work: pick your accent from the smallest, most saturated entry rather than the most common one, and check the contrast of any pair you intend to use as text-on-background (aim for a 4.5:1 ratio for body text). The lightness ordering here helps: take backgrounds from the top of the list and text from the bottom.
Point sampling instead
If you want one specific colour rather than the overall scheme — the exact shade of a jacket, a background you need to match seamlessly — Image colour picker reads individual pixels on click and reports hex, RGB, and HSL for each.
FAQ
How are the colours chosen?
By median cut — the image's pixels are treated as points in RGB space, the box containing them is repeatedly split along its widest axis, and each final box contributes its average colour. It is the classic quantisation algorithm, and unlike "count the most frequent pixels" it finds distinct colours rather than several near-identical shades of the same dominant one.
How many colours should I ask for?
Five to eight for a usable design palette. Two or three for a minimal scheme. Sixteen or more if you are analysing an image rather than designing from it — beyond that you get shades rather than colours, which is interesting but not a palette.
Why are the results sorted oddly?
They are ordered by lightness, brightest first, which makes them easier to read as a scheme — the top entries are your backgrounds and highlights, the bottom ones your text and shadows. The extraction order itself carries no meaning.
What is the palette strip PNG for?
Pasting into a document, a moodboard, or a message. Each colour is a labelled block with its hex printed on it, so the file is self-documenting when someone opens it six months later.
Can I extract from several images at once?
Yes. Each file gets its own swatch row and its own strip, and the code export combines all of them with duplicates removed — which is a quick way to build one scheme from a set of reference photos.