Appearance
Color palettes
Below is a selection of well known color palettes, downloadable in different formats.
16 colors
4-bit RGBI (CGA)
Color Graphics Adapter (CGA) was a graphics card released in 1981 for the IBM PC.
While its common 320×200 graphics mode could display only 4 colors at once from restricted palettes (each with a low-intensity and high-intensity mode), it used internally a 4-bit color system which allowed 16 different colors, and in text-mode it was possible to produce all 16.
Below are all the possible 16 colors in CGA 4-bit RGBI system, it uses 1 bit for each primary color (Red, Green Blue) and the last bit is used as a selector for brightness (Intensity).
0 (0000)
1 (0010)
2 (0100)
3 (0110)
4 (1000)
5 (1010)
6 (1100)
7 (1110)
8 (0001)
9 (0011)
10 (0101)
11 (1101)
12 (1001)
13 (1011)
14 (1101)
15 (1111)
Download CGA
This palette was also later used as the default 16-color palette for the later EGA card (so it might also sometimes be considered as "the EGA palette", despite EGA allowing other colors).
Arne's Palette
Arne designed his Generic 16 color palette as a practical game palette, it's one of the first modern 16 colors palettes at gained popularity in pixel art circles.
It includes darker colors with both warm and cool options, so black-backgrounds can still have detailed foregrounds and shading, it tries to be more functional.
VOID
GRAY
WHITE
RED
MEAT
DARKBROWN
BROWN
ORANGE
YELLOW
DARKGREEN
GREEN
SLIMEGREEN
NIGHTBLUE
SEABLUE
SKYBLUE
CLOUDBLUE
Download Arne Palette v20
PICO-8 palette
The palette of the PICO-8 fantasy console is one of the most well known modern 16 color palettes.
It's very functional but also has a more candy-like, playful selection of colors. It's popular for tiny games, pixel-art experiments, and artists that look for a retro but vivid style.
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
Download PICO-8
32 colors
DAWNBRINGER
This palette was created by DawnBringer, a user on the Pixel Joint forums.
It has become a very popular all-purpose pixel-art palette widely used in pixel artist communities. It has a recognizable “retro but not hardware-specific” look.
Black
Valhalla
Loulou
Oiled Cedar
Rope
Tahiti Gold
Twine
Pancho
Golden Fizz
Atlantis
Christi
Elf Green
Dell
Verdigris
Opal
Deep Koamaru
Venice Blue
Royal Blue
Cornflower
Viking
Light steel blue
White
Heather
Topaz
Dim gray
Smokey ash
Clairvoyant
Brown
Mandy
Plum
Rainforest
Stinger
Download DawnBringer 32
Endesga 32
Endesga-32 / EDG32 is another popular palette in pixel art circles. It was originally created for NYKRA, but it was made very popular for indie projects (having its own category/tag in itch.io).
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
Download Endesga 32
64 colors
6-bit RGB (EGA range)
The IBM EGA allowed for 64 possible colors, made from 2 bits per RGB channel. However, they could normally show up to 16 colors at once, selected from those 64 (often the 16 colors in the CGA palette were used as the default).
Note that the bits in EGA are distributed in the format rgbRGB, where the last 3 bits (RGB) are the most significant digits for the respective color and the first 3 bits (rgb) are the least significative. This results in a 8x8 matrix with the 8 hues from CGA overlapping.
0 (000000)
1 (000001)
2 (000010)
3 (000011)
4 (000100)
5 (000101)
6 (000110)
7 (000111)
8 (001000)
9 (001001)
10 (001010)
11 (001011)
12 (001100)
13 (001101)
14 (001110)
15 (001111)
16 (010000)
17 (010001)
18 (010010)
19 (010011)
20 (010100)
21 (010101)
22 (010110)
23 (010111)
24 (011000)
25 (011001)
26 (011010)
27 (011011)
28 (011100)
29 (011101)
30 (011110)
31 (011111)
32 (100000)
33 (100001)
34 (100010)
35 (100011)
36 (100100)
37 (100101)
38 (100110)
39 (100111)
40 (101000)
41 (101001)
42 (101010)
43 (101011)
44 (101100)
45 (101101)
46 (101110)
47 (101111)
48 (110000)
49 (110001)
50 (110010)
51 (110011)
52 (110100)
53 (110101)
54 (110110)
55 (110111)
56 (111000)
57 (111001)
58 (111010)
59 (111011)
60 (111100)
61 (111101)
62 (111110)
63 (111111)
Download 6-bit EGA
Resurrect 64
This is a popular 64 color palette created by Kerrie Lake.
It's cozy, colorful but not painfully neon. It gives enough colors for full game visuals, offering more versatility while still restricting the gamut enough for it to look unified.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
Download Resurrect 64
256 colors
VGA Palette
This is the standard VGA 256-color palette: the first 16 EGA-style colors, 16 grays, nine hue cycles, and the trailing black entries.
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182
183
184
185
186
187
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255
Download VGA 256
Doom palette
Doom stores its palette in the PLAYPAL lump, containing 256 indexed entries.
In the game, based on the lighting or the distance fog, the colors might be mapped to darker equivalents within the palette (resulting in 33 "COLORMAP" mappings, 32 for light levels plus an extra one for invulnerability), so this palette was designed to have a few different color "ramps" that scale in brightness.
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182
183
184
185
186
187
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255
Download Doom PLAYPAL
Note that there are some duplicates in the palette, left out at the limits of some of the ramps. So in actuality the palette has 249 unique colors intead of 256. Below are the duplicates:
- #000000: 0, 247
- #ffffff : 4, 168, 208, 224
- #4f0000 : 45, 190
- #430000 : 47, 191
- #000053 : 207, 240
332 palette
This palette uses 3 bits for red, 3 bits for green, and 2 bits for blue.
The representation below is divided into 4 quadrants of increasing blue value and inside each quadrant red increases horizontally and green vertically.
00
20
40
60
80
A0
C0
E0
01
21
41
61
81
A1
C1
E1
04
24
44
64
84
A4
C4
E4
05
25
45
65
85
A5
C5
E5
08
28
48
68
88
A8
C8
E8
09
29
49
69
89
A9
C9
E9
0C
2C
4C
6C
8C
AC
CC
EC
0D
2D
4D
6D
8D
AD
CD
ED
10
30
50
70
90
B0
D0
F0
11
31
51
71
91
B1
D1
F1
14
34
54
74
94
B4
D4
F4
15
35
55
75
95
B5
D5
F5
18
38
58
78
98
B8
D8
F8
19
39
59
79
99
B9
D9
F9
1C
3C
5C
7C
9C
BC
DC
FC
1D
3D
5D
7D
9D
BD
DD
FD
02
22
42
62
82
A2
C2
E2
03
23
43
63
83
A3
C3
E3
06
26
46
66
86
A6
C6
E6
07
27
47
67
87
A7
C7
E7
0A
2A
4A
6A
8A
AA
CA
EA
0B
2B
4B
6B
8B
AB
CB
EB
0E
2E
4E
6E
8E
AE
CE
EE
0F
2F
4F
6F
8F
AF
CF
EF
12
32
52
72
92
B2
D2
F2
13
33
53
73
93
B3
D3
F3
16
36
56
76
96
B6
D6
F6
17
37
57
77
97
B7
D7
F7
1A
3A
5A
7A
9A
BA
DA
FA
1B
3B
5B
7B
9B
BB
DB
FB
1E
3E
5E
7E
9E
BE
DE
FE
1F
3F
5F
7F
9F
BF
DF
FF
Download 332 palette