A free color blind test, and a camera that shows how colorblind people see
Colors is a free color blind test you can take in your browser, followed by a live camera that shows the world the way someone with a different kind of color vision sees it. It takes about a minute, there is nothing to install, and your answers never leave your device.
How the test works
You look at twelve dot plates, in the classic style, and pick the number you see. Each plate is generated fresh, so nobody can learn the answers. The hidden number differs from the dots around it only in colors that one kind of color vision cannot tell apart, so the plates that are easy for one person can be invisible to another. Two control plates, which everyone can read, catch a dim screen or a misread.
At the end you see which pattern of color vision your answers most resemble, and how strongly it showed. It is a playful estimate, not a medical test and not a diagnosis. Screen brightness, lighting and display settings all change what you see. If you want to know about your color vision, see an optometrist or ophthalmologist.
See the world through their eyes
The live camera turns whatever you point your phone at into a simulation of protan, deutan or tritan color blindness, or no color at all, and lets you dial the strength from mild to complete. Split view shows normal vision and the simulation together, and one tap turns it into an image to share. The gallery does the same for fifty photos: famous places like the Golden Gate Bridge and the red gates of Fushimi Inari, forests in the fall, strawberries and traffic lights, a red jacket on a green mountainside, Van Gogh and Rembrandt. You can also choose your own photos and see them all at once in a different kind of color vision.
The kinds of color blindness
- Deutan (green-weak): the most common kind. Greens and reds move toward each other, so grass can look tan and ripe fruit hides among the leaves.
- Protan (red-weak): reds lose their brightness and blend into greens and browns, and red lights can look dim.
- Tritan (blue-yellow): rare, and equally common in men and women. Blues and yellows are the hard pair.
- Monochromacy: very rare. Color is replaced by light and shade.
Around 1 in 12 men and 1 in 200 women have some form of red-green color blindness.
Questions
- Is this an Ishihara test? It uses the same idea of numbers hidden in dots, but the plates are generated by Colors rather than copied from the Ishihara book.
- Is it accurate? It is a game. A phone or laptop screen is not a calibrated test chart, so treat the result as a conversation starter, not a diagnosis.
- Is it free? The test is free and unlimited. Your first 6 photos are free too. Colors Premium unlocks the unlimited live camera, Enhance mode, and swapping and adding as many photos as you like.
- Does it work on iPhone? Yes, in Safari, and there is also a Colors app for iPhone.
- What happens to my data? Your answers, names and photos stay in your browser, and the camera never records or uploads anything. Read the privacy policy.