An important aspect of color for both low vision and colorblind users is sufficient contrast between foreground (text or graphics) and the background.
As a rule, OIT documents and websites will meet Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) version 2.0 criteria. All OIT documents and websites will meet a minimum AA rating, and AAA wherever possible. The colors chosen in this guide have been selected to ensure that the base colors meet the minimum conrtrast requirments, but if you need to extend the color palette, several online tools are available to help detemine if the colors meet the minimum criteria.
For OIT, the color palette chosen for documents and divisions is a subset of the website palette used in the US Web Design System in order to ensure maximum contrast. OIT divisions will only use the OIT document color palette for documents, and websites will use the US Web Design Standard color palette as the default. At all times, minimum contrast ratios will be maintained.
Additional Tools
- North Carolina State Color Contrast Tool (preloaded with OI&T colors)
- WebAIM Color Contrast Tool
- Accessible Palette Builder
- Contrast Grid
This page includes links to other websites outside our control and jurisdiction. VA is not responsible for the privacy practices or the content of non-VA Web sites. We encourage you to review the privacy policy or terms and conditions of those sites to fully understand what information is collected and how it is used.
