color
Pluralcolors
UK spellingcolour
Pluralcolors
Formscolors, coloring, colored
- 1The quality of an object or of light that the eye sees as red, blue, green, and so on, depending on the wavelengths reflected or given off; any one such hue.
Each color in the rainbow blends smoothly into the next.
Designers chose a bold color for the company's new logo.
UsageAsk what color something is. Things come in a color: a shirt in blue, in bright colors.
- 2The shade of human skin, especially when treated as a marker of race or ethnicity.
Laws once divided citizens by color.
He spoke about the barriers people still face because of their color.
UsageOften in because of their color or regardless of color. It touches race, so use it with care.
Similarcomplexion, race, ethnicity
Note
A word that carries social weight: it names skin tone as people have used it to sort one another, and it was central to legal and social classification in many societies. Complexion is the neutral word for an individual face, while race and ethnicity name the group.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 3 facts
- People have historically classified human groups by skin color. en.wikipedia.org
- Color-based classification shaped legal and social distinctions, as documented in the United States. census.gov
- Color-based classification also underpinned apartheid law and society in South Africa. apartheidmuseum.org
- 3Hues of any kind as opposed to black, white, and gray, especially in pictures, film, television, or printing.
The painting uses color sparingly against a wide field of gray.
Without color, the design relies entirely on light and shadow.
UsageWith in and no article: shown in color, as opposed to in black and white.
- 4
- 5To fill the areas within the outlines of a line drawing using colored markers or crayons.
She finds it relaxing to color after a long day.
The students colored within the lines very neatly.
UsageUse color in a drawing or color within the lines.
Note
The outline sets the standard of neatness, which gives the familiar praise of coloring within the lines.
- 6Conveying full color, as opposed to only shades of gray.
The documentary includes rare color footage of the city in the 1930s.
Early color photographs were expensive and difficult to produce.
UsageBefore a noun: color television, color photos. The opposite is black-and-white.
Oppositemonochrome, black-and-white
Note
John Cheever's Falconer (1977) shows it standing after the verb, in a TV that is four years old, color.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
- John Cheever wrote Falconer, first published in 1977. openlibrary.org
- Falconer contains an example of color after the verb, describing a four-year-old television. en.wiktionary.org
- 7The particular shade or combination of shades that identifies a school, team, club, or other group, especially as worn by its members or fans.
Fans in their club's colors packed the stadium hours before kickoff.
The sorority's official color is pale lavender, and new members wear a lavender ribbon.
UsageWith an owner: the club's colors, our school colors. Fans wear the colors; a player joining a rival switches colors.
- 8
- 9Vivid, expressive detail or flavor that makes something interesting or enjoyable.
The reporter's anecdotes gave the piece real color.
Good travel writing thrives on vivid local color.
UsageSet phrases: local color, color commentary. Writing can have color or lack color.
Similarflavor, life, vividness, richness, interest
Note
Local color is the texture a writer gives to a place. Color commentary is the anecdote and background a color commentator adds to a broadcast.
Less common meanings
- 10The hue of a person's face or skin, especially as a sign of health or emotion, whether rosy and healthy, flushed, or pale.
After the long walk, color came back into her pale face.
Fever often brings a high color to the cheeks.
UsageA high color means a flushed face; when someone recovers, color comes back to the face.
Similarcomplexion, flush, glow
Note
Sir Henry Stewart Cunningham's Late Laurels (1863) describes a woman whose high color softens to "a warm, delicate tint." For the act of flushing itself, English uses the verb.
Checked 3 Nov 2026 · 3 facts
- Sir Henry Stewart Cunningham wrote Late Laurels. en.wiktionary.org
- Late Laurels first appeared in 1863. en.wikipedia.org
- The work describes a woman's high color softening to the quoted tint. en.wiktionary.org
- 11To become red, especially in the face, as a result of increased blood flow.
He colored deeply at the unexpected praise.
Her face tends to color in the cold wind.
UsageThe person or face is the subject: she colored, her face colored. It is close to blush.
Similarblush
Note
It is the verb that matches the noun for a flushed complexion.
- 12
- 13To attribute a quality to someone or something; to portray as being a certain way.
Color me skeptical, but I doubt this plan will work.
The senator actually showed up to the town hall? Color me surprised.
UsageMostly in color me + adjective: color me surprised, a playful way to state your own reaction.
Similarcall
Note
Outside that formula the verb means casting something in a particular light, usually with as, as when unrest is colored as merely local. Call is its nearest synonym, and it shades toward the sense "to influence".
- 14A flag, banner, or standard carried or flown to represent a nation, military unit, or organization.
Each regiment marched behind its color at the start of the campaign.
The crew raised the ship's colors as they entered the harbor.
Note
Military use often takes the plural: a regiment carries its colors, and losing them can break its morale. The plural names the flag as an emblem of allegiance, much as banner or standard do, but with a sharper sense of honor at stake. The same plural runs through the national flag, gang insignia and the school sporting award.
Checked 30 Oct 2026 · 3 facts
- Military terminology uses both singular "color" and plural "colors" for flags. gutenberg.org
- Losing regimental colors can destroy soldiers' morale. nps.gov
- Regimental colors embody military honor. nam.ac.uk
- 15Distinctive insignia or clothing worn to signal membership in a particular gang.
At the funeral, the gang turned out in full colors, blue bandanas and all.
On that corner, wearing the wrong color could be read as a challenge to the rival crew.
Note
On the street, colors are worn rather than carried or flown: they are the jacket, patch or bandana that marks a member's gang. As with the regimental standard, the word stays plural even for a single garment. The stakes are again allegiance, so turning up in a rival's colors is a provocation.
Checked 30 Oct 2026 · 2 facts
- Gang colors signify allegiance. dcjs.virginia.gov
- Wearing colors associated with a rival gang can provoke violence. ncfgt.org
- 16The distinctive character or timbre of a sound, such as that of an instrument, an orchestral passage, a voice, or a vowel.
The orchestrator chose muted strings to darken the color of the passage.
Adding a harp lent the whole section a shimmering color.
Similartimbre, tone, character, quality
Note
Orchestrators treat timbre as something to place. In Samuel Adler's The Study of Orchestration (1982), Brahms saves the higher violin color for the foreground statement and gives the soft background to middle-register violins and violas. Color is the composer's word for this choice, and timbre is its technical synonym.
Checked 30 Oct 2026 · 2 facts
- Samuel Adler wrote The Study of Orchestration, first published in 1982. samuelhadler.com
- Adler describes Brahms reserving higher violin color for the foreground and assigning the soft background to middle-register violins and violas. en.wiktionary.org
- 17A false appearance or pretext, especially an appearance of legal right or authority, as in 'under color of law'.
The official seized the goods under color of a regulation that did not exist.
Their committee acted with the color of authority but no legal standing.
Similarpretext, guise, semblance, pretense, appearance
Note
This is the lawyer's sense, and it lives almost entirely in the phrase under color of: of law, of a statute, of authority. The Parliamentary Privilege Act 1770 pairs it with pretense, which shows how close it sits to a plain pretext. Most often, though, the false appearance is one of legal right. An act done under color of law can look authorized without being so.
Checked 30 Oct 2026 · 2 facts
- The Parliamentary Privilege Act 1770 pairs colour with pretence. hansard.parliament.uk
- Acting under color of law can involve actual or purported authority; it does not necessarily mean authorization is absent. ca11.uscourts.gov
- 18An award granted for sporting achievement, especially within a school or university.
After leading the rowing team to three straight wins, he was awarded a full color at the end-of-year dinner.
Few students earn their colors before the final year.
Note
Schools and universities award colors for a sport, and the construction names the game with for: awarded colors for his football, a color for cricket. The award usually entitles the holder to wear the team's insignia. That is how the colors a team wears came to name a prize.
Checked 30 Oct 2026 · 2 facts
- Schools and universities award colors for sporting achievement. en.wiktionary.org
- The award generally carries permission to wear identifying insignia. gnet.tgc.vic.edu.au
- 19In snooker, any of the balls other than the reds: the yellow, green, brown, blue, pink, or black.
Her miss on an easy color in the final frame handed her opponent the match.
Once all the reds are gone, each color is potted in order.
Oppositered
Note
Snooker divides its object balls into reds and colors, even though the reds are colored too, so the name works by exclusion. Once the last red and the color played after it are done, the colors are potted in a fixed order. The plural, the colors, therefore names that closing stretch of a frame as well as the balls themselves.
Checked 30 Oct 2026 · 2 facts
- The object balls divide into reds and colors; there is also a white cue ball. en.wikipedia.org
- After legally potting the last red, the player may first attempt a color of their choice; the fixed sequence follows that stroke. wpbsa.com
- 20The daily military ceremony in which the national flag is raised in the morning or lowered in the evening.
- 21To assign colors to the vertices of a graph, or the regions of a map, so that no two joined by an edge or a shared border share a color.
- 22In heraldry, any of the standard dark tinctures used on a coat of arms, such as azure, gules, sable, or vert.
- 23A property of quarks that comes in three values (red, green, and blue) which they exchange by passing gluons; also called color charge.
- 24The overall lightness or darkness of a mass of printed or written text as it appears on a page.
- 25Gold in the form of small particles found in soil or gravel while prospecting.
- 26In options trading, a measure of how fast an option's gamma changes as time passes, or how its charm shifts as the underlying price moves.
- 27In professional wrestling, blood shed during a match, often from a deliberate small cut, as in 'get color'.
- 28To turn a tobacco pipe, typically one made of meerschaum, a deep dark shade by smoking it over a long time.
- 29To change the sound of a vowel or other speech sound.
Showing meanings only.
Practice
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Origin
Latin color passed into Old French as colour and into Anglo-Norman as colur, and Middle English borrowed it as colour or color. Noah Webster made the spelling color popular in modern American English, so that it would match the Latin source and keep American spellings consistent.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 4 facts
- Latin color developed into Old French colour and Anglo-Norman colur. en.wiktionary.org
- Middle English borrowed the word as colour or color. en.wiktionary.org
- Noah Webster popularized color in modern American English. en.wiktionary.org
- Webster's reasons included matching Latin and making the spellings of related words consistent. en.wiktionary.org