I’m starting a new website and looking for a background color. In the past I’ve always chosen something from the “web-safe colors” palette. I’ve read some other things that make me wonder how necessary this is. I don’t want to be unduly constrained to limited color choices if it’s no longer necessary.
What is the wisdom of the group when it comes to background and link colors? Web-Safe only, or not?
I think it’s safe to say that you can use pretty much any color. I think the days of web-safe colors are lingering as most monitors today can produce millions of color options.
The purpose of web-safe colors was to provide a way to consistently produce the same color no matter which monitor you used. Now this isn’t to say they looked exactly the same due to the variety of monitors and color contrast ratios they have, but generally it produced the same consistent results. So, with that said you could use a color that might look slightly lighter or darker on a monitor other than your own, but it won’t be drastic and not the result of your color choice but how the people viewing it are in regards to their own monitor quality.
I’d vote for use any color you would like and I think you’ll be fine.