Strategic color use in UX design: from accessibility to user conversion
Color is one of the most powerful tools in a designer's toolkit. In UX design, how we apply color—and how we understand its impact on perception, decisions, and behavior—has changed a lot in recent years. Instead of relying on general ideas about how colors make people feel, modern UX design takes a more thoughtful, research-based approach.
Today's UX professionals integrate accessibility standards, conversion metrics, and systematic user testing to make color decisions that serve functional goals beyond assumed psychological effects.
In this post, we’ll walk you through how to make strategic color choices that aren’t just visually appealing, but accessible and optimized for real user behavior.
Moving beyond color psychology: a strategic approach
According to Nielsen Norman Group research, users form first impressions of digital interfaces in as little as 50 milliseconds. Visual design elements are the primary drivers of these snap judgments. Colors are particularly powerful in shaping these initial reactions. While traditional guidelines—such as limiting palettes to 3-4 colors to prevent visual overload or maintaining sufficient contrast—remain relevant, the UX landscape of 2025 demands more sophisticated considerations.
One could argue UX professionals have it harder since we know more about human cognition and decision-making. When implementing color in the designs, one must carefully consider:
- How it aligns with brand identity
- If it complies with accessibility standards
- Support information hierarchy
- Functions consistently and effectively across devices and contexts
Since digital experiences are more personalized than ever, strategic use of color is no longer just an artistic choice—it’s a data-driven design tool that directly influences user engagement and conversions.
Color's role in modern interface design
Establishing visual hierarchy and user focus
The strategic use of color directs user attention and establishes a visual hierarchy in interface design. Variations in color and contrast can guide users to the most important elements on a page.
A 2021 study on mobile user interfaces found that users exhibit a strong bias toward the top-left corner, with text and images attracting more attention than color or size variations.
This suggests that while color is a vital tool, its effectiveness is enhanced when combined with strategic placement and content prioritization.
Accessibility and inclusive design considerations
Accessibility shouldn’t be an afterthought in digital product design. Recent legislation and regulations in the EU ensure that it wouldn’t be. The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG 2.2) provide specific requirements for color contrast to ensure digital products are usable by people with various visual abilities.
However, accessibility is more than just compliance—it’s about designing for real-world inclusivity. If you're interested in how UX teams can integrate accessibility at every stage of the design process, check out this blog post on our inclusive design journey.
Compliance with minimum contrast standards (4.5:1 for body text, 3:1 for large text) not only enhances usability for users with visual impairments, but also improves readability across diverse lighting conditions and device screens.
Fortunately, several user-friendly tools can help you achieve compliant color contrasts without compromising brand identity, even while designing. Here are three top-rated options:
- Stark - A Figma plugin for real-time contrast checking, colorblind simulations, and accessibility compliance.
- A11y - A Figma plugin that gives feedback on the text of your UI designs on whether it meets WCAG’s AA and/or AAA level compliance.
- Contrast Checker by WebAIM - A simple, quick, and free color contrast checker website.
Dark mode: preference or practicality?
Dark mode has gained widespread adoption, with research showing that users prefer it for both usability and aesthetics. With 81.9% of users now enabling dark mode on at least some of their devices, adaptable color palettes must be designed to function across both light and dark themes.
- While light mode provides maximum contrast (black text on a white background), studies suggest it may contribute to eye strain and fatigue over time, particularly with prolonged screen use.
- Conversely, dark mode reduces emitted light, making it more comfortable in low-light environments and potentially extending battery life on OLED screens.
However, dark mode isn't without drawbacks—reading white text on dark backgrounds can slow reading speed, despite improving comprehension. Additionally, many devices now feature Night Shift (iOS) and Night Light (Android/Windows), which add a warm, yellow tint to screens after sunset to reduce blue light exposure. This means that whatever color choices designers make, they may look different at night for a large portion of users.
As UX design continues to evolve, implementing adaptable dark mode strategies remains key to balancing visual comfort, accessibility, and user preferences.
AI-driven personalization
One of the biggest shifts in 2025 UX design is the rise of AI-powered, adaptive color systems. Machine learning enables interfaces to dynamically adjust colors based on user preferences, device settings, and contextual factors.
- Dynamic theme generation – UI color schemes adjusted based on time of day, weather, or mood tracking.
- Personalized branding – AI-driven tools suggesting optimized palettes based on user engagement data.
- Context-aware accessibility – Automated contrast adjustments catering to vision impairments or different screen technologies.
Companies like Google and Apple are pioneering adaptive interfaces that modify color schemes based on usage patterns and environmental factors. In 2021, Google introduced Material You, a design system that enables dynamic theming by extracting colors from users' wallpapers to create personalized, harmonious interfaces. To assist designers in implementing this system, Google released the Material Theme Builder, a Figma plugin that facilitates the creation of cohesive themes aligned with user preferences. Apple also came out with its own customization options in 2024 with iOS 18, allowing users to tint app icons and adjust themes. While this feature offers personalization, it has been critiqued for its limited scope compared to Google's earlier implementation.
However, this is just the beginning—as AI-driven design improves, dynamic themes and user customization will become a standard part of UI design.
Designing with color: a step-by-step approach
As designers, we follow a structured process to ensure color choices are accessible, consistent, and effective—and you can, too. A systematic approach to color implementation helps maintain clarity and usability across digital interfaces.
Building accessible color systems
To create a functional and inclusive color system, follow these steps:
- Establish a base palette aligned with brand guidelines.
- Test contrast ratios across all color combinations to meet accessibility standards.
- Define semantic color roles for actions, warnings, and informational elements.
- Develop light and dark mode variations to accommodate different user preferences.
- Document usage guidelines to maintain consistency across platforms.
By following this process, designers can create color systems that are visually cohesive, accessible to all users, and adaptable to different contexts.
Quantitative and qualitative approaches to evaluate color choices
Creating a structured color system is only half the process: it’s testing that ensures it truly works. Beyond simply checking if colors comply with WCAG 2.2, you can achieve the best results by combining data-driven metrics with user feedback, to ensure that color choices enhance usability, readability, and trust.
Quantitative testing: hard data that speaks for itself
These methods provide measurable insights into how users interact with color:
- A/B testing – Compare color variations for CTAs, alerts, and UI elements to determine which drives better engagement.
- Heatmaps & eye-tracking – Analyze where users focus most and whether colors effectively guide attention. Check out our full guide on how to use eye-tracking in your research.
- First-click testing – Assess if users instinctively click on the intended elements based on color hierarchy.
- 5-second tests – Evaluate initial impressions and clarity of color choices.
A great real-world example of A/B testing in color selection comes from none other than Google. In what became one of the most well-known UX experiments, Google tested 41 different shades of blue for its hyperlink text to determine which variation drove the highest user engagement. This data-driven approach led to a significant discovery: subtle color changes had a measurable impact on user behavior and revenue, ultimately generating an estimated $200 million in additional annual revenue.
Beyond the financial success, the experiment reinforced an essential principle of brand consistency. Google consistently uses blue as a primary color across its products, from the Google logo to services like Google Search, Drive, and Maps. This uniformity not only maintains a cohesive visual identity but also strengthens brand recognition and trust among users.
Qualitative testing: insights beyond the numbers
While metrics help optimize color effectiveness, user perception and experience matter too. During usability tests, consider asking:
- Before visiting this website/app: What do you expect it to look like?
- What element on this screen seems most important to you?
- Where would you click/tap first? Why?
- How would you rate the readability of this content from 1-5?
- Where would you click to complete [specific task]?
- Does this interface feel professional/trustworthy? Why or why not?
- Is there anything that is difficult to read or notice on this screen?
Focusing on evaluating color choices in UX research goes beyond simply meeting accessibility standards—it provides insights into what guides user behavior, how colors convey brand identity, and how they impact usability, navigation, and readability. Strategic color choices are an essential part of modern UX, but they work best when combined with other UI trends that enhance user engagement and accessibility.
Color is more than just aesthetics
Gone are the days of relying on vague psychological claims about color—today, UX design is all about evidence-based choices that actually move the needle. The best color decisions are backed by:
- Real user behavior data—not just assumptions.
- Accessibility-first thinking—because good design works for everyone.
- Technical precision—colors that stay consistent across devices and lighting conditions.
- Systematic design approaches—cohesive, adaptable, and scalable.
When designers test, validate, and refine their color choices, they create products that don’t just look good but also improve usability, readability, and overall user experience. Because in the end, the right color choices do more than being visually pleasing: they help people navigate, engage, and take action.
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Credits
This blog post was written by Anna-Zsófia Csontos, UX researcher
Fact-checking by Bence Mózer, UX/UI designer
Proofreading by Johanna Székelyhidi, marketing manager
