A hue with grey added — a more muted, softer version of the same colour.
Produced by desaturating a hue toward grey while roughly preserving lightness — distinct from a tint (lighter) or shade (darker).
'Tone' is also used informally to mean lightness value generally ('tonal contrast') — the strict tint/shade/tone distinction is a separate, narrower usage.
Sage green is a toned-down version of a brighter grass green.
Tone is what makes many 'muted' or 'dusty' colour trends possible — the same hue, softened.
A tone is described by a fall in chroma at roughly constant lightness and hue: a smaller C* in CIELAB LCH or a smaller C in OKLCH with L unchanged. Painters reach it by mixing in grey or a little of the complementary colour, which removes chroma faster than it removes light.
| Step | OKLCH lightness | OKLCH chroma | HSV saturation |
|---|---|---|---|
| Emerald Green #50c878 | 0.75 | 0.158 | 60% |
| 50% chroma #87bb94 | 0.74 | 0.078 | 28% |
| 25% chroma #9bb4a0 | 0.75 | 0.040 | 14% |
| Grey #acacac | 0.74 | 0.000 | 0% |
Halving the chroma takes Emerald green from #50c878 to #87bb94, a sage-like green, and removing it entirely leaves the grey #acacac. OKLCH lightness stays at 0.75 down the whole column, which is the point of a tone: greyer, not lighter or darker.
How this was calculated: Each step keeps the catalogue colour's OKLCH lightness and hue and multiplies its chroma, then converts back to sRGB; rounding to 8-bit HEX moves lightness by less than 0.01.
Reducing saturation with an HSL slider to make a calmer version of a colour.
HSL holds its own lightness figure fixed, not perceived lightness, so a desaturated yellow comes out much darker than the original and a desaturated blue much lighter. Lowering OKLCH chroma gives the tone that was intended.