If you have ever used a color picker, worked with CSS, or tried to match a brand color exactly, you have encountered the three main digital color formats: RGB, HEX, and HSL. They all describe the same colors, but they describe them in completely different ways. Knowing what each format means, where each one is used, and how to convert between them makes working with color in any digital context much easier.

What Is RGB

RGB stands for Red, Green, Blue. It is the color model used by screens — your phone, monitor, television, and any other light-emitting display creates colors by mixing red, green, and blue light at different intensities. When all three are at maximum intensity, you get white. When all three are at zero, you get black. Every other color in between is created by some combination of these three values.

In digital use, each channel has a value from 0 to 255, giving 256 possible values per channel and a total of over 16 million possible colors. The format is written as rgb(red, green, blue) where each value is between 0 and 255.

RGB Color Examples

Red

rgb(255, 0, 0)

Maximum red, zero green and blue

Indigo

rgb(79, 70, 229)

Medium red, low green, high blue

Dark Navy

rgb(26, 26, 46)

Very low values with slightly higher blue

What Is HEX

A HEX color code is simply the RGB values written in hexadecimal notation. Hexadecimal is a base-16 number system that uses digits 0 through 9 and then A through F to represent values 0 through 15 in a single character. Each RGB channel from 0 to 255 can be expressed as two hexadecimal digits, which is why a full HEX color code is 6 characters long preceded by a hash symbol.

The first two characters represent the red channel, the next two represent green, and the last two represent blue. So #FF0000 is the same as rgb(255, 0, 0) — pure red, because FF in hexadecimal equals 255, and 00 equals zero.

HEX Color Examples

Red

#FF0000

FF = 255 red, 00 = 0 green, 00 = 0 blue

Indigo

#4F46E5

4F = 79 red, 46 = 70 green, E5 = 229 blue

White

#FFFFFF

Maximum value in all three channels

What Is HSL

HSL stands for Hue, Saturation, Lightness. Unlike RGB and HEX which describe colors in terms of their component light channels, HSL describes colors in a way that is much more intuitive for humans. You choose a base color (hue), how vivid or muted it is (saturation), and how light or dark it is (lightness).

Hue is expressed as a degree from 0 to 360 on a color wheel. 0 and 360 are both red, 120 is green, 240 is blue, and other values fall between. Saturation is a percentage from 0 (completely grey) to 100 (fully vivid color). Lightness is also a percentage, where 0 is black, 100 is white, and 50 is the pure color.

HSL Color Examples

Red

hsl(0, 100%, 50%)

Hue 0 degrees, fully saturated, medium lightness

Indigo

hsl(243, 75%, 59%)

Hue near blue, high saturation, medium-light

Muted Blue-Grey

hsl(240, 12%, 72%)

Same hue, low saturation, high lightness

RGB vs HEX vs HSL Comparison

FormatExampleRangeBest Used When
RGBrgb(79, 70, 229)0-255 per channelWorking with image software, CSS, programmatic color mixing
HEX#4F46E500-FF per channelCSS code, copying from design tools, brand color codes
HSLhsl(243, 75%, 59%)0-360 hue, 0-100% sat and lightCreating color variations, theming systems, intuitive color adjustments

When to Use Each Format

HEX is the most commonly used format in web development and design. Copy a color from Figma, Canva, or any design tool and it gives you a HEX code. CSS stylesheets typically use HEX codes. Brand style guides specify brand colors in HEX. For day-to-day web work, HEX is the default.

RGB is useful when you need to work with the individual color channels programmatically, such as when creating gradients by manipulating individual values in code, or when working with image processing where you need precise control over each channel. CSS supports rgb() values directly alongside HEX.

HSL is the most intuitive format for designing color systems. If you have a brand color and you want to create a lighter version for a background, a darker version for text, and a muted version for borders, HSL makes this trivial: just adjust the lightness and saturation values while keeping the hue the same. This is why many modern CSS design systems and frameworks use HSL variables for their color scales.

How to Convert Between Formats

HEX to RGB

#4F46E5 → R: 4F(hex) = 79, G: 46(hex) = 70, B: E5(hex) = 229 → rgb(79, 70, 229)

Convert each pair of HEX characters from base 16 to base 10 to get the RGB values. Any color picker tool does this instantly.

RGB to HEX

rgb(79, 70, 229) → 79(decimal) = 4F, 70 = 46, 229 = E5 → #4F46E5

Convert each RGB value from base 10 to base 16 to get the HEX pair. Pad single-digit results with a leading zero.

RGB to HSL

Normalize R, G, B to 0-1 range → Calculate max, min, delta → Derive H, S, L using formulas

The math for RGB to HSL conversion is more complex. The easiest approach is to use a color picker tool that shows all three formats simultaneously and lets you switch between them instantly.

Use Textaura's free color picker to convert between HEX, RGB and HSL instantly and pick any color you need.

Open Color Picker

Frequently Asked Questions

Is HEX the same as RGB?

They describe the same color model and encode exactly the same information. HEX is just a more compact notation for the same RGB values written in hexadecimal. The color #FF0000 and rgb(255, 0, 0) are identical — they both describe the same red color. You can convert between them without any loss of information.

Which color format is best for CSS?

All three work in CSS — you can use #hex, rgb(), and hsl() values interchangeably in stylesheets. HEX is the most traditionally used in CSS. HSL has grown popular in modern design systems because it makes creating color variations much easier. RGB is useful when you need to add transparency using rgba(), though modern CSS also supports hsl() with an alpha channel.

What is RGBA and HSLA?

RGBA and HSLA are extensions of RGB and HSL that include an alpha channel for transparency. The alpha value ranges from 0 (fully transparent) to 1 (fully opaque). For example, rgba(79, 70, 229, 0.5) is the indigo color at 50 percent opacity. Modern CSS also supports a slash syntax: rgb(79 70 229 / 50%) works the same way in current browsers.

Why does the same HEX color look different on different screens?

Different screens have different color calibrations, gamuts, and brightness settings. A color that appears as a vivid purple on a wide-gamut display may look slightly different on a standard display. This is a hardware and calibration issue rather than a problem with the color format itself. Professional design work typically involves display calibration to ensure color accuracy.