RGB to HSL Converter
Transform RGB values into intuitive HSL format
Enter HEX Color
Converted Values
#3B82F6
rgb(59, 130, 246)
hsl(217, 91%, 60%)
Color Format Guide
- HEX: #RRGGBB format used in CSS and design tools
- RGB: Red, Green, Blue values (0-255) for precise color control
- HSL: Hue (0-360°), Saturation (%), Lightness (%) for intuitive adjustments
What is RGB to HSL Conversion?
RGB tells you how a color is made from light, but HSL tells you what the color actually is. Converting from RGB to HSL reveals the human-readable properties hidden in those three numbers.
When you see rgb(59, 130, 246), it's hard to know if that's warm or cool, bright or muted. Convert to hsl(217, 91%, 60%) and suddenly you know: it's a blue (217°), highly saturated (91%), at medium brightness (60%).
Why Convert RGB to HSL?
HSL makes color manipulation predictable. In RGB, making a color lighter means increasing all three values—but by how much? In HSL, you simply increase lightness. Need a darker shade? Decrease lightness. It's that intuitive.
Designers working with accessibility particularly benefit. Testing contrast ratios? Lightness differences map directly to perceived contrast. Building dark mode? Invert your lightness values systematically.
How the Conversion Works
The conversion extracts meaning from RGB values:
1. Normalize RGB to 0-1 range (divide by 255) 2. Find the maximum and minimum values 3. Calculate lightness: (max + min) / 2 4. Calculate saturation based on lightness and range 5. Derive hue from which channel is dominant
The resulting hsl() values make color relationships immediately apparent.
Common Use Cases
- Analyzing extracted colors from images
- Building systematic color palettes
- Creating accessible color combinations
- Converting design tool outputs to CSS
Pro Tip
Colors with similar hue values will harmonize naturally. Use HSL to identify and group related colors from different sources.
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