Color Blindness Effects
1 In 12 Web Site Visitors!

© John Dow

Did you know that up to 1 in 12 web site visitors have some type of color blindness? This is based on the general facts that up to 8 out of 100 men, and .05% of women have a color viewing issues. According to the statistics I've seen, red and green seem to be the two colors most people have trouble with.

Think about traffic lights, or the Xmas season with green and red being a problem to view properly. And consider your web site designs that may use red and green, how much trouble is it for a visitor to view your content?

People with these problems tend to not see the difference between red and green. Many times both colors may appear as shades of yellow. Contrast disappears and these two colors tend to bleed into each other. If the shades of red and green tend towards the brighter side, this problem is reduced but not eliminated.

The last figures I read on legibility on web sites rated dark blue type on a clean white background as the best color combination. I think that may be one of the reasons that you see hyperlinks in blue, it's the most legible color combination and designers want people to see the hyperlinks.

I'm kind of partial to red, green I can leave or take. Part of it is that we are taught from a young age to recognize red as a possible danger (stop lights, stop signs, danger signs, etc.). So if your eye detects anything red in color, you stop and actually look at it to see if there is some nearby threat or warning.

In my web site designs, I've often used red to draw attention to a piece of information that I want visitors to see. In fact one of my standard methods is to use dark blue for headlines, then throw in a red headline that is most important. That has always seemed to work well for drawing immediate attention to that information.

People with color viewing issues may see this red headline as a shade of yellow, which may not have the same impact. although I do think that it still may draw their attention. But I will stay to a much brighter red in the future since it may help some what for people with color issues.

Colors do seem to have a big impact on mood and attention. I've tested many combinations and found that the blue type on a white background, and dark blue headlines do increase conversions. I can't tell you a scientific reason but I can state that there is a positive factor involved due to my results.

So it's always a good idea to consider the colors on any web design. Stay to the safe viewing colors recommended due to the limited abilities of video cards, and consider that all people don't view all colors the same way.

There is also a "standard" of sorts that is called Browser Friendly or Browser Safe colors. Netscape originally established this standard years ago and many still rely on it today. All of the major browsers have adopted this color set to help web site designers with choosing colors that display the same across all video devices.

Without getting too technical, these colors are limited to the basic 256 available on any computer equipment including our friends with Macs. These browser safe colors will display the same across all makes and models of equipment. You can see the colors and Hex values here:

Web Site Safe Color Chart

Your best bet in using colors is to stick to both a pleasing combination and consider the legibility. You want people to be able to view your information, the Internet is a very visual medium. Consider the fact that some people may have a color blindness or problem viewing some colors.