Pantone Color Converter
Convert Pantone codes to RGB/HEX and find the nearest Pantone for any hex color.
Written by Golam Rabbani, Founder & Lead Engineer
How to use this pantone color converter
- Choose a direction in the dropdown: Pantone code to RGB/Hex, or Hex to nearest Pantone.
- For code-to-RGB, type the Pantone Solid Coated code (e.g. "185 C" or "Cool Gray 9 C").
- For hex-to-Pantone, paste any hex value or pick one with the color picker.
- Press Convert to look up the entry in the bundled Pantone table.
- Copy the result — code, hex, RGB triple, and (in hex mode) the Euclidean RGB distance to the nearest Pantone.
About this pantone color converter
The Pantone color converter maps Pantone Solid Coated codes to their on-screen sRGB approximations and vice versa. Codes are looked up in a bundled, hand-curated table of widely-cited Pantone-to-sRGB values committed to the repository — there is no live API call, so the tool keeps working offline and the values do not drift between visits. When you convert from hex, the converter computes the Euclidean distance in RGB space against every entry in the table and returns the closest match.
Worked example: searching for "185 C" returns hex #e4002b and RGB(228, 0, 43). Going the other direction, pasting #3b82f6 (Tailwind blue-500) returns the nearest entry — Pantone 286 C at #0033a0 — with a distance of about 117 RGB units, telling you the nearest swatch is in the right hue family but noticeably darker.
Note that the bundled values are screen approximations of the Solid Coated guide. Always verify against a current printed swatch book before sending colors to a printer.
FAQ
- How accurate is this Pantone color converter compared to a real swatch book?
- The bundled values are widely-cited sRGB approximations of the Solid Coated guide and are accurate enough for screen preview, but printed swatches will always be the source of truth for production.
- Does the tool call the Pantone API?
- No. The lookup table is bundled in the repo at lib/data/pantoneColors.ts and the conversion runs entirely in your browser.
- Which Pantone library is supported?
- The table is drawn from Pantone Solid Coated. Coated and Uncoated guides have slightly different sRGB approximations because the paper finish changes how the spot ink appears.
- Why might my code return "not in bundled table"?
- The bundled table covers the most-used Pantone Solid Coated codes, not the entire library. If your code is missing, convert your CMYK or printed swatch to hex elsewhere and use the hex-to-Pantone direction to find the closest bundled match.
- Why does the same hex not always map back to the Pantone I expect?
- Nearest-Pantone is Euclidean distance in sRGB, which is not perceptually uniform. Colors that look similar to the eye can sit far apart in RGB and vice versa, so always sanity-check the swatch visually.