10 sources for fresh color palette inspiration

When it comes to design, color is everything. The right color palette can elevate a project, evoke emotions, and connect with audiences in powerful ways. But with so many options, finding fresh color inspiration can sometimes feel like a challenge. To help, here’s a list of 10 fantastic online resources that offer unique and beautiful color palettes for any design or animation project.

Adobe Color

Adobe Color is one of the top resources for color exploration, thanks to its dynamic color wheel and customization tools. You can create your own palette from scratch or draw inspiration from the Adobe community, where designers share their favorite color schemes. The site allows you to explore various trends, color systems, and color theory rules, making it perfect for anyone who wants to experiment with unique color combinations that just work.

Best for: Designers looking for in-depth color tools and community inspiration.

Coolors

Coolors is a favorite among designers for its ease of use and beautiful, pre-made palettes. With a click, you can generate a random palette and record color codes that catch your eye. The website also allows you to upload photos to extract colors from images, and you can save and export your palettes with ease.

Best for: Quick palette generation with tons of customizable options.

Linearity Curve

With Linearity Curve, you can create a custom color palette by extracting colors from images in your Photos App. Our software will automatically extract six random color swatches from the image and add a new custom-made palette to your library. This tool is great for creating cohesive color schemes based on photos you love, whether they’re your own or ones you find online.

Best for: Designers looking for a fast, intuitive way to generate colors directly from images.

Jumpstart your creative ideas with Linearity Curve and Linearity Move

Download the Linearity suite

Jumpstart your creative ideas with Linearity Curve and Linearity Move

Color Hunt

Color Hunt is a community-driven platform where designers share and vote on color palettes. It has a no-fuss, minimalist aesthetic, which makes it especially popular for web and app design. You can browse color schemes by popularity, newest additions, or specific categories like “Retro” or “Winter.” Plus, you can save your favorite palettes to your collection for later.

Best for: Trend-focused designers who want community-curated color palettes.

Colormind

Colormind is an AI-powered color palette generator that learns color styles from photographs, movies, and art. Colormind’s palettes feel fresh and modern, making them ideal for tech, fashion, and UI design projects. You can also upload your own images to create unique color schemes based on their contents.

Best for: Cutting-edge designs that need an AI-driven twist on color combinations.

Pinterest

Pinterest is a goldmine for discovering colors. Whether you’re looking for inspiration for a specific project or just browsing for ideas, Pinterest offers an endless array of boards, pins, and collections curated by fellow designers. Searching for color palette pins is quick, and the visual nature of the platform makes it easy to save and organize your favorite schemes for future reference.

For specific hex codes, you can use tools like the ColorZilla browser extension or Image Color Picker to extract exact color values directly from Pinterest images, allowing you to recreate any palette you love.

Best for: Creative mood boards and visual inspiration from designers worldwide.

Design Seeds

Design Seeds is a vibrant blog that curates color palettes inspired by nature and photography. Each palette is carefully chosen based on real-life visuals, making it perfect for designers seeking natural, organic colors. You can browse palettes by theme, such as “Ocean,” “Autumn,” or “Pastel,” offering a diverse range of tones for every project.

Best for: Designers looking for nature-inspired color palettes with a calming aesthetic.

Muzli Colors

Muzli Colors is a simple but highly effective tool for discovering color palettes, with the added bonus of being able to search by keyword and style. Muzli also gives you access to an ever-growing database of trending color combinations, perfect for staying ahead of design trends.

Best for: Keeping up with current color trends and quick palette generation.

Paletton

Paletton is an intuitive online color wheel tool that allows you to create custom color palettes using various color systems and harmony rules. You can start with a base color and explore complementary, triadic, and tetradic schemes to build balanced and visually appealing palettes. Paletton also offers a preview feature, where you can see your colors applied to sample designs, making it easy to visualize how they’ll look in action.

Best for: Designers who want an interactive, color wheel-based tool to experiment with.

Color Supply

Color Supply is a neat little tool that allows you to generate color palettes based on different color harmonies. With real-time previews and the ability to lock color codes, it’s a great tool for designers who like a bit of structure and want to experiment with different color relationships.

Best for: Designers who want to experiment with color harmonies and relationships.

How to import color palettes into Linearity Curve

Now that you have all the resources you need to find new color palettes, it's time to start using them in your designs. You can import colors into Linearity Curve as swatches and ASE formats.

Jumpstart your creative ideas with Linearity Curve and Linearity Move

Download the Linearity suite

Jumpstart your creative ideas with Linearity Curve and Linearity Move

To import a Color Palette in Curve, tap the + button at the top right corner of the Palettes Tab and then choose Import. Select the swatches file or the Adobe ASE file and tap on it and the palette will be automatically displayed in the Color Picker menu.

You can also drag and drop colors from Procreate to Linearity Curve:

OPTION 1: Select the Color Palette in Procreate and hold and drag it while simultaneously bringing Linearity Curve to the screen foreground and drop the Palette directly into the Palettes Tab of Curve.

OPTION 2: Another option is to open Curve and Procreate simultaneously on iPad in Split View Mode and then repeat the steps as described above.

To streamline your workflow, you can set your new palette as the Primary Palette. This makes the colors conveniently accessible, displaying them directly at the bottom of your Color Picker tab.

That's it! Have fun experimenting with color.