Color Identifier App for iPhone and Android: What to Use
The right colour app depends on the job: colour blindness, spoken colours, design codes or paint. Free picks for iPhone and Android, and their limits.
Color Blind Pal is the one to try first. Point the camera at something and it names the colour in plain words. It is free on both iPhone and Android, with nothing to buy inside it. If you cannot see the screen, Microsoft’s Seeing AI says the colour aloud. If you want a hex code for design work, get Color Picker: Photo & RAL.
Paint is the hard case. A phone gets you a near match, and the apps’ own listings explain why it stops there.
We went through the App Store and Google Play listing of every app below. Most of the ten apps this article named in 2019 have left the stores or can no longer be traced to a listing.
What your phone already does
Both iPhone and Android have colour settings built in, and they are about the screen. They help you tell colours apart in apps and on web pages. They do not name the colour of a shirt.
- iPhone: go to Settings, Accessibility, Display & Text Size, then Color Filters. Apple’s user guide says a filter can show the screen in greyscale, adjust colours for colour vision deficiencies or tint it. On the same screen, Differentiate Without Color replaces colour-only signals with shapes or text.
- Android: go to Settings, Accessibility, Color and motion, then Color correction. Turn on Use color correction, choose a mode and set its strength with the slider. Google’s help page says the setting helps the phone compensate for colour blindness.
Samsung goes a step further on Galaxy phones. Its support site describes a colour detection mode in Bixby Vision that says the colour aloud when you point the camera at an object. The page covers Bixby Vision 3.5 and later and does not name the phones that have it, so look through Bixby Vision’s accessibility modes before you install anything.
Why a phone only gets close
A phone camera reads the same surface differently under different light, and the apps say so themselves:
- Color Picker from Smart Tools co. says the colour changes with the lighting, and lets you take the reading by the light of the phone’s torch.
- Color Meter asks you to hold a sheet of white paper in view so it can correct for the colour and strength of the light in the room.
- Color Grab has a calibration mode that uses a white object in the same way.
- Examine Clothes Color tells you to work indoors, out of direct sunlight, about 40cm from the clothes. It fires the flash itself.
- Mikhail Gribanov’s Color Picker ends its listing with a plain warning that it is “not intended for high-accuracy matching”.
Treat every reading as a near match. If the app offers a white reference or a calibration step, use it.
Colour identifier apps compared
| App | Maker | Where to get it | What it does |
|---|---|---|---|
| Color Blind Pal | Vincent Fiorentini | iPhone: free. Android: free, no ads. | Names the colour in plain words. A filter mode separates the colours you confuse. |
| What Color Is This? | Nicholas Troia | iPhone: free, in-app purchases. Android, as What Color? Instant Color ID: free, no ads. | Colour name with HEX, RGB and HSL codes. Nearest match in Pantone, RAL and other libraries. |
| Seeing AI | Microsoft | iPhone: free. Android: free, no ads. | Speaks the colour. Made for blind and low-vision users. |
| Color Picker: Photo & RAL | lapnito | iPhone: free. Android: free, no ads. | Colour codes from the camera or a photo. Nearest RAL Classic shade. |
| Color Meter | Contechity AB | iPhone, as Colorimeter Camera Color Meter: free, in-app purchases. Android: free, in-app purchases. | Readings corrected against a sheet of white paper. Nearest RAL and Munsell colours. |
| Cone | Mystical Bits | iPhone only: free, in-app purchases. | Nearest Pantone shades, plus name and hex code. |
| Examine Clothes Color | Masao Miyake | iPhone only: free. | Says the colours and pattern of a piece of clothing. |
| Color Grab | Loomatix | Android only: free with ads, in-app purchases. | Colour names and codes. The volume buttons make it say the colour. |
| Color Picker: Find Name & Code | Mikhail Gribanov | Android only: free with ads, in-app purchases. | Colour names and codes, with a RAL Classic list built in. |
If you are colour blind
Color Blind Pal was built for this. Its Color Inspector describes whatever the camera is pointed at, and you can choose between common, scientific and everyday names. Its Color Filter shifts the colours you find hard to separate towards ones you can. A stripes option marks reddish areas with a pattern and leaves the colours alone.
The Android version is current. The iPhone version’s page shows it has gone years without an update, though it is still on the App Store and still free.
What Color Is This? is the alternative on either phone. Its listing puts colour vision deficiency first among the people it is built for, and it gives the colour’s codes along with the name. Use either app together with the phone’s own colour filter, which takes care of what is on the screen.
If you cannot see the screen
Seeing AI is Microsoft’s free app for blind and low-vision users. Identifying colours is one of its tools, next to reading text and describing photos, and everything it finds is spoken.
On iPhone, Examine Clothes Color does one narrow job. Photograph a piece of clothing and it says up to four colours and the pattern, such as stripes or checks. Its developer says it is designed to be used with VoiceOver.
On Android, Color Grab’s listing says pressing a volume button makes it say the colour. It carries ads, and its Google Play page shows it has not been updated for several years, so Seeing AI is the safer first choice.
Colour codes for design work
Color Picker: Photo & RAL reads a colour from the camera or from a photo and gives it as HEX, RGB, HSL, CMYK and LAB. Its listing says it works offline with no ads and no subscriptions, and neither store shows a purchase label on it.
Color Meter is the one to pick if you care about the lighting problem, because the white-paper reference is its main feature. Both stores mark it as having in-app purchases.
If the code you need is a Pantone number, Cone on iPhone says it is licensed by Pantone and offers up to ten nearest shades. What Color Is This? searches Pantone and RAL among more than 25 colour libraries.
Matching paint
Several apps will give you a nearest named shade. Color Picker: Photo & RAL compares a reading with the RAL Classic catalogue. Cone and What Color Is This? do the same with Pantone. That gives you a name to take to the paint counter.
The paint makers’ own apps tell you how much to trust a camera. Benjamin Moore’s Color Portfolio (iPhone, Android) is free and lets you try its colours on a photo of your room. For what it calls precision colour matching, it tells you to buy a separate ColorReader device.
Sherwin-Williams Color Expert (iPhone, Android) previews colours on your walls and lets you order physical colour chips. Its App Store listing says sample ordering is limited to the US and Canada.
When the companies selling the paint point you to a hardware reader or a physical chip, take the hint. Use the phone to narrow the choice, then check a real sample against the wall before you buy. Those two apps only cover their makers’ own ranges. If you buy another brand, see whether it has an app of its own.
Which one to pick
- Colour blindness: Color Blind Pal, with the phone’s own colour filter for the screen.
- Blind or low vision: Seeing AI. On iPhone, add Examine Clothes Color for getting dressed.
- Hex, RGB or CMYK codes: Color Picker: Photo & RAL.
- A steadier reading in awkward light: Color Meter, with a sheet of white paper.
- Pantone: Cone on iPhone, What Color? Instant Color ID on Android.
- Paint: any of these for a starting name, then a real sample.
What happened to the old list
Swatches has left the App Store. The colour detectors from Mobialia, RamelTec and MAX-INVEST no longer turn up when you search Google Play. Three more entries had names so general (Image Color Identifier, Color Identifier, Color Picker) that we could not tie them to one listing among the many that now share those names.
Color Grab and Examine Clothes Color are still listed and are covered above. Be careful with Color Grab on iPhone: the App Store has an app with the same name from a different developer. The one we mean, from Loomatix, is on Google Play.
ColorMeter from vistech.projects is still on Google Play as a paid app. Its free edition marks most of its features as paid-only and has gone years without an update, so we have left it out of the table.
Quick answers
Is there an app that identifies colours?
Yes. Color Blind Pal and What Color Is This? both name the colour the camera is pointed at, on iPhone and Android. Seeing AI says it aloud.
What is the best free colour identifier app for iPhone?
Color Blind Pal, Seeing AI and Color Picker: Photo & RAL are all free on the App Store with no in-app purchases shown. Pick by need: colour names, spoken colours or design codes.
Is there an app to identify a paint colour?
Apps can give the nearest RAL or Pantone shade to what the camera sees. For a precise match, Benjamin Moore’s own app sends you to a separate colour reader device, so confirm with a physical sample.
How do I find the code of a colour?
Open Color Picker: Photo & RAL, point it at the colour or load a photo, and read off the HEX, RGB or CMYK value.
Does my phone have a colour blind mode?
iPhone has Color Filters under Accessibility, Display & Text Size. Android has Color correction under Accessibility, Color and motion. Both adjust the screen only.
