List of video game console palettes

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This is a full list of color palettes for notable video game console hardware.

For each unique palette, an image color test chart and sample image (original True color version follows) rendered with that palette (without dithering unless otherwise noted) are given. The test chart shows the full 8-bit, 256 levels of the red, green and blue (RGB) primary colors and cyan, magenta and yellow complementary colors, along with a full 8-bit, 256 levels grayscale. Gradients of full saturation of intermediate colors (orange, yellow-green, green-cyan, blue-cyan, violet, and red-magenta), and a full hue spectrum are also present. Color charts are not gamma corrected.

Atari[]

Atari 2600[]

The Television Interface Adaptor^[1] (TIA) is the custom computer chip that generated graphics for the Atari Video Computer System game console. It generated different YIQ color palettes dependent on the television signal format used.^[2]

NTSC[]

With the NTSC format, a 128-color palette was available, built based on eight luma values and 15 combinations of I and Q chroma signals (plus I = Q = 0 for a pure grayscale):

Hue	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15
Luma
0, 1
2, 3
4, 5
6, 7
8, 9
10, 11
12, 13
14, 15

The above image assumes there is no limit on the number of colors per scan line. With the system's actual color restrictions (and proper change in aspect ratio), the same image would look very different:

PAL[]

With the PAL format, a 104-color palette was available. 128-color entries could still be selected, but due to the different color encoding scheme, 32 color entries results in the same eight shades of gray:

Hue	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15
Luma
0, 1
2, 3
4, 5
6, 7
8, 9
10, 11
12, 13
14, 15

The above image assumes there is no limit on the number of colors per scanline. With the system's actual color restrictions (and proper change in aspect ratio), the same image would look very different:

SECAM[]

The SECAM palette was reduced to a simple 3-bit RGB, containing only 8 colors (black, blue, red, magenta, green, cyan, yellow and white) by mapping the luma values:

0, 1

2, 3

4, 5

6, 7

8, 9

10, 11

12, 13

14, 15

Lynx[]

This section needs expansion with: a simulation of the sample image. You can help by . (September 2021)

The Atari Lynx used a 4096-color palette. The video hardware was custom built and designed by Jay Miner and David Morse^[3] It used two chips, named Mikey and Suzy.^[4] Resolution was 160×102 pixels and it was possible to use 16 simultaneous colors per scanline.

Nintendo[]

NES[]

The Picture Processing Unit (PPU) used in the Nintendo Entertainment System generates color based on a composite video palette.^[5]

The 56-colors can be created based on four luma values, twelve combinations of I and Q chroma signals and two series of I = Q = 0 for several pure grays. There are two identical whites, one of the blacks has less-than-zero brightness, and one of the lighter grays is within 2% of another, so sometimes the palette has been reported to have 52 to 55 colors.

In addition to this, it had 3 color emphasis bits which can be used to dim the entire palette by any combination of red, green and blue. This extends the total available colors to 448, but inconveniently divided into 8 variations of the base 56. Because it affects the whole palette at once it may be considered more of a filter effect applied to the image, rather than an increased palette range.

The PPU produces colors outside of the TV color gamut, resulting in some colors being presented differently on different TV systems.

Hex Value	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	A	B	C	D	E	F
0x00
0x10
0x20
0x30

The NES PPU uses a background palette with up to 13 of these colors at a time, consisting of one common backdrop color and four subpalettes of three colors, chosen from the above set. The PPU's video memory layout allows choosing one subpalette for each 16×16 pixel area of the background. (A special video mode of the MMC5 mapper overrides this, assigning a subpalette to each 8×8-pixel tile.) Sprites have an additional set of four 3-color subpalettes (with color 0 being transparent in each) and every 8x8 or 8x16 pixels can have their own subpalette, allowing for a total of 12 different colors to use for sprites at any given time, or a total of 25 on-screen colors.

Because of the constraints mentioned above, converting a photograph often results in attribute clash at 16×16-pixel boundaries. Conversions with and without dithering follow, using the hex palette 0F160608 0F162720 0F090010 0F0A1910 (the repeated 0F represents black as the common backdrop color).

Without dithering	With dithering

Game Boy[]

The original Game Boy uses a monochrome 4-shade palette. Because the non-backlit LCD display background is greenish, this results in a "greenscale" graphic display, as it is shown in the simulated image (at Game Boy display resolution), below. The Game Boy Pocket and Game Boy Light uses a monochrome 4-shade palette using actual gray.

Original Game Boy	Game Boy Pocket/Light

Original Game Boy Hex / Binary	0x0 00	0x1 01	0x2 10	0x3 11
Game Boy Pocket/Light Hex / Binary	0x0 00	0x1 01	0x2 10	0x3 11

Super NES[]

The Picture Processing Unit (PPU) used in the Super NES has a 15-bit RGB (32,768 color) palette, with up to 256 simultaneous colors.

However, while the hardware palette can only contain 256 entries, in most display modes the graphics are arranged into between 2 and 4 layers, and these layers can be combined using additive or subtractive color blending. Because these blended colors are calculated by the hardware itself, and do not have to be represented by any of the existing palette entries, the actual number of visible colors onscreen at any one time can be much higher.

The exact number depends on the number of layers, and the combination of colors used by these layers, as well as what blending mode and graphical effects are in use. In theory it can show the entire 32,768 colors, but in practice this is rarely the case for reasons such as memory use. Most games use 256-color mode, with 15-color palettes assigned to 8x8 pixel areas of the background.

Theoretical 32768-color	Practical 256-color

Game Boy Color[]

The Game Boy Color systems use a 15-bit RGB (32,768 colors) palette.

The specific Game Boy Color (Type 3) game cartridges presents up to 56 colors without the use of special programming techniques from the full 32,768. From these, 32 are for a background palette, plus 8 hardware sprite palettes, with 3 colors plus transparent each. Typically sprite palettes share some colors (black, white or others), so the total colors displayed may be less than 56.

Though there is a 56 color limit, this in of itself is a palette storage limit and not an actual hardware limitation. As such, the programmer can swap out the palettes on a per-scanline basis. Because of this ability to swap out the palettes each scanline, over eight thousand colors can actually appear on screen per frame when programmed on a per-scanline basis.

Simulated

When an older monochrome original Game Boy game cartridge (Type 1) is plugged-in, if certain combinations of the controls are held during startup (or if the game is recognized from a hard-coded list in the device's ROM), the games are colorized with one of the factory 12 false color palettes. In this mode, games can have from 4 to 10 colors, due 4 are for the background plane palette and there are two more hardware sprite planes palettes, with 3 colors plus transparent each.

The following shows these startup palettes (background plus both sprite planes) and the combination of controls used (the names are taken from the Game Boy user's manual; the colors are simulated):

Combo	Up	Down	Left	Right
	Brown	Pastel mix	Blue	Green
A	Red	Orange	Dark blue	Dark green
B	Dark brown	Yellow	Grayscale	Inverted

Color palette[]

This section needs expansion. You can help by . (March 2019)

Nintendo Game Boy color palette by keypad reference

Combination	OBJ0				OBJ1				BG0				Palette reference	Welcome-splash
Up													$12
Up–A													$B0
Up–B													$79

Game Boy Advance[]

The Game Boy Advance/SP/Micro systems also uses a 15-bit RGB palette, and along with the original and Color modes, they have also a specific Highcolor 32,768 colors mode. The LCD displays of the Micro and some models of the SP are backlit, giving brighter images.

Compatible mode	32,768-color

DS[]

This section needs expansion. You can help by . (April 2019)

The DS has an 18-bit RGB color palette, making a total of 262,144 possible colors; of these, 32,767 simultaneous colors can be displayed at once.

3DS[]

The 3DS has a 24-bit RGB palette.

Sega[]

Master System[]

The Master System had a 6-bit RGB palette (64 colors), with 31 colors on-screen at once. It is possible to display all 64 colors at once using raster effects (line interrupts). The console used a proprietary chip called Video Display Processor (VDP) with the same internal design as the Texas Instruments TMS9918 (used in the SG-1000), although with enhanced features such as extra colors.^[6]

There are only 512 different 8x8 tile patterns to cover the screen though, when 768 would be required for a complete 256x192 screen. This means that at least 1/3 of the tiles will have to be repeated. To help maximize tile reuse, they can be flipped either vertically or horizontally. The 64 sprites of 8x16 pixels can also be used to help to cover the screen (max 8 per scanline).

Because of the constraints mentioned above, there are no current accurate simulated screen images available for the Sega Master System.

0x00

0x01

0x02

0x03

0x04

0x05

0x06

0x07

0x08

0x09

0x0A

0x0B

0x0C

0x0D

0x0E

0x0F

0x10

0x11

0x12

0x13

0x14

0x15

0x16

0x17

0x18

0x19

0x1A

0x1B

0x1C

0x1D

0x1E

0x1F

0x20

0x21

0x22

0x23

0x24

0x25

0x26

0x27

0x28

0x29

0x2A

0x2B

0x2C

0x2D

0x2E

0x2F

0x30

0x31

0x32

0x33

0x34

0x35

0x36

0x37

0x38

0x39

0x3A

0x3B

0x3C

0x3D

0x3E

0x3F

Mega Drive/Genesis[]

The Mega Drive/Genesis used the Sega 315-5313 (Yamaha YM7101) Video Display Processor, providing a 9-bit RGB palette (512 colors, up to approximately 1500 including shadow and highlight mode) with up to 61 colors on-screen at once without raster effects (4 palette lines of 16 colors each, palette indices $x0 are definable but considered as transparent, and can only be used as the background color).

Game Gear[]

The Game Gear had a 12-bit RGB palette (4096 colors), with 32 colors on-screen at once.

32X[]

This section needs expansion. You can help by . (May 2019)

The Sega 32X had a 15-bit RGB palette (32768 colors), with all colors available for display.

NEC[]

TurboGrafx-16[]

The TurboGrafx-16 used a 9-bit RGB palette consisting of 512 colors with 482 colors on-screen at once (16 background palettes of 16 colors each, with at least 1 common color among all background palettes, and 16 sprite palettes of 15 colors each, plus transparent which is visible as the overscan area).

Fairchild[]

Channel F[]

This section needs expansion with: the addition of the color test chart with only the 8 colors shown below. You can help by . (August 2021)

The Fairchild Channel F is able to use one plane of graphics and one of four background colors per line, with three plot colors to choose from (red, green, and blue) that turned into white if the background is set to black, at a resolution of 128 × 64, with approximately 102 × 58 pixels visible.^[7]

In total there are 8 possible colors:^[8]

Mattel Electronics[]

Intellivision[]

This section needs expansion. You can help by . (July 2021)

The Intellivision uses a 16-color palette.

0	1	2	3
4	5	6	7
8	9	A	B
C	D	E	F

Epoch[]

Super Cassette Vision[]

This section needs expansion. You can help by . (August 2021)

The Super Cassette Vision uses a 16-color palette.

#000000	#ff0000	#ffa100	#ffa09f
#ffff00	#a3a000	#00a100	#00ff00
#a0ff9d	#00009b	#0000ff	#a200ff
#ff00ff	#00ffff	#a2a19f	#ffffff

Magnavox[]

Odyssey 2[]

This section needs expansion. You can help by . (October 2021)

The Magnavox Odyssey 2 uses a 4-bit RGBI color palette.

See also[]

• Color depth
• Computer monitor
• Indexed color
• List of 8-bit computer hardware palettes
• List of 16-bit computer hardware palettes
• List of color palettes
• List of home computers by video hardware
• List of monochrome and RGB color formats
• List of software palettes
• Palette (computing)

References[]