Color Mixing Chart: Primary, Secondary and Tertiary Colors

A color mixing chart shows what you get when you combine colors. Once you understand three ideas (primary, secondary and tertiary colors) you can mix almost any color from a small set of paints. This page covers the classic red-yellow-blue color wheel used in art classes, with notes on the cyan-magenta-yellow model used in printing and the red-green-blue model used on screens.

Primary colors

Primary colors are the starting colors you mix everything else from. In the traditional art-class color wheel, the primaries are:

Red
Yellow
Blue

You can't mix primaries from other paint colors. (In printing, the primaries are cyan, magenta and yellow; on screens, they're red, green and blue light.)

Secondary colors

Secondary colors are made by mixing two primaries in roughly equal amounts.

Mix	Secondary color	Guide
Red + yellow	Orange	What colors make orange
Yellow + blue	Green	What colors make green
Blue + red	Purple	What colors make purple

Tertiary colors

Tertiary colors are made by mixing a primary with the secondary next to it. They're named with the primary first.

Mix	Tertiary color
Red + orange	Red-orange
Yellow + orange	Yellow-orange
Yellow + green	Yellow-green
Blue + green	Blue-green (teal-like)
Blue + purple	Blue-purple (violet)
Red + purple	Red-purple (magenta-like)

Together, the 3 primaries, 3 secondaries and 6 tertiaries make the 12-color wheel.

Complementary colors

Colors directly opposite each other on the wheel are complementary:

Red and green
Blue and orange
Yellow and purple

Side by side, complements make each other look brighter. Mixed together, they cancel out into brown, gray or near-black. See what colors make brown and what colors make black.

Tints, shades and tones

Term	How to make it	Example
Tint	Color + white	Red + white = pink
Shade	Color + black (or a dark complement)	Blue + a little black = navy
Tone	Color + gray	Green + gray = sage

Common mixes at a glance

Want	Mix
Brown	Red + yellow + blue, or any two complements
Pink	Red + white
Peach	Orange + white
Lavender	Purple + white
Teal	Blue + green
Turquoise	Blue + green + white
Olive	Green + a little red, or yellow + a little black
Maroon	Red + a little brown or blue
Navy	Blue + a little black or orange
Gray	Black + white, or complements + white
Gold	Yellow + a little orange + a touch of brown
Tan / beige	Brown + white + a touch of yellow

Why your mixes turn muddy

Too many colors. Mixing more than two or three colors usually makes brown.
Hidden third colors. Many reds contain a little yellow and many blues contain a little yellow or red. Mixing them can accidentally include all three primaries. Choose a pink-leaning red and a purple-leaning blue for clean purples.
Too much black. Use complements or darker versions of the same color to darken instead.

Mixing with crayons, markers and colored pencils

Dry media don't mix on a palette, but you can layer colors on paper: light color first, darker color on top, light pressure. Yellow under blue makes green; yellow under red makes orange; red under blue makes purple. Our guide to how to color with colored pencils explains layering step by step.

Practice it

Print a blank 12-section color wheel, or use any mandala coloring page: color the outer ring with the 12 colors in order, and the inner ring with their tints. It's a quick way to learn the chart by heart.