Free Munsell Color Converter
Translate between screen colors and the Munsell notation painters use, browse all 40 hue pages of the 1943 renotation as chip grids or as the Munsell tree, pick colors from your own photo, and print the tree. Every conversion is cross-checked against the colour-science reference library. Exports PDF. Free, with no sign-up, and your picture never leaves your device.
Approximate Munsell notation
3.5YR 5.7/8.5
Value 5.71, chroma 8.51, hue 13.53 on the 100-step circle, solved against the 1943 renotation.
Chart
Every chip of 5R in the renotation data. A ring marks your colour; a white corner marks a chip beyond the sRGB gamut. Arrow keys move through the page.
Approximation, stated plainly: conversions use the 1943 Munsell renotation data (2,734 published chips, Illuminant C) with Bradford adaptation to your screen’s D65, and are cross-checked against the colour-science library. Monitors vary and no screen can show the deepest chromas: treat the result as a close working reference, not a measurement of a physical Munsell Book chip.
Paper
All 40 hue pages.Every published chip, page by page, as a value-by-chroma grid you can click or walk with the arrow keys.
The Munsell tree.A hue page facing its complement across the neutral axis, on screen and as a 21-page printable PDF.
Pick from a photo.Load a reference and click a spot for its Munsell notation, averaged over 5 × 5 pixels.
Mix this chip.Send any color or chip to the paint mixing simulator as a target and get a recipe from your paints.
- Free
- No sign-up
- Runs in your browser: your image never leaves your device
What is a Munsell color converter?
A Munsell color converter translates a screen color into Munsell notation, hue, value and chroma written as H V/C, and turns a notation back into a color. This one solves against the 1943 renotation data, agrees with the colour-science library to within 0.1 of a hue step, and shows every published chip.
How to use the Munsell Color Converter
The tool takes 6 steps, all on your device.
Choose the direction: Color → Munsell to read a screen color, or Munsell → Color to preview a notation.
For Color → Munsell, type a hex color, use the color picker, pick from the screen where your browser allows it, or load a photo and click a spot on it.
Read the approximate H V/C and the nearest published chip side by side, then copy the notation or press Mix this colour to get a paint recipe.
Below the result, the hue page of your color shows every published chip of that hue, with a ring on yours. Step through all 40 pages, or switch to Tree to see the page facing its complement.
Click any chip (or move with the arrow keys and press Enter) to read it; Mix this chip opens the paint mixing simulator with that color as the target.
Download the printable tree: a cover with the hue circle and twenty cross-sections of the Munsell solid.
What the Munsell Color Converter does
The Munsell Color Converter builds on the renotation data, adapts to Illuminant C, and solves hue and chroma before a check.
Built on the renotation data
The Munsell Color Converter works from the 2,734 published chips of the 1943 Munsell renotation by Newhall, Nickerson and Judd. The converter brings Munsell notation, the painter's language of hue, value and chroma, into our color tools for artists.
Adapted to Illuminant C
The converter adapts your sRGB color from the screen's D65 white to Illuminant C with the Bradford transform, because the renotation chips are specified under Illuminant C.
Munsell value from luminance
Munsell value is calculated from luminance with the ASTM D1535-08 polynomial, relative to a perfect white diffuser, from 0 for ideal black to 10 for ideal white; screen white reads N 10/ and #808080 reads N 5.3/.
Hue and chroma solved, then checked
Notation to color interpolates the renotation chips in hue, value and chroma. Color to notation inverts that model with a Newton solve, so a chip's own color comes back as that chip. Against colour-science 0.4.6 (BSD licence) on thirteen sRGB colors, readings agree within 0.09 of a hue step, 0.001 of a value and 0.07 of a chroma step: the default #c87846 reads 3.5YR 5.7/8.5, and colour-science gives 3.58YR 5.714/8.452.
Neutrals in N notation
A color on or very near the Illuminant C neutral point is reported as N with its Munsell value, so #808080 reads N 5.3/. A near-gray keeps a low chroma: #c0bcb8 reads 8.7YR 7.6/0.4.
Gamut and data flags
Munsell → Color flags a chip outside the sRGB gamut, such as 5G 5/10, and clamps its swatch; on the pages a white corner marks each such chip. A second note marks requests beyond the published data, such as a Munsell value below 1 or above 9. Photos and colors stay in your browser.
For painters who plan color in Munsell terms
Beginners, working painters, art students and art teachers plan color in Munsell terms with it.
Beginners
Type N 2/, N 5/ and N 8/ in Munsell → Color to see the Munsell value scale as three grays.
Working painters
Convert the hex color of a passage in a reference and read its Munsell value and chroma before mixing it.
Art students
Compare 5R 6/4 with 5R 6/10 in Munsell → Color to see what six chroma steps look like at one value.
Art teachers
Print the tree and walk a class through a hue and its complement, value by value, before a mixing exercise.
Reading the notation
The hue is a position on a 100-step circle of ten families (R, YR, Y, GY, G, BG, B, PB, P, RP), each divided into ten; 5R is the center of red and 10R its edge toward yellow-red. That circle is not the painter's RYB wheel, one of the two wheels the color wheel offers for complementary, analogous and triadic schemes. Chroma counts steps away from neutral gray with no fixed ceiling; the strongest renotation chips reach /38.
How the conversion works (and its honest limits)
The nearest published chip is the chip on the nearest hue page, at the nearest whole value and the nearest even chroma, so it is the chip the ring marks on the page. Beyond the gamut flags, the limits are physical: monitors drift, room light changes what you see, and Munsell's scales were set for painted chips viewed in daylight, not for glowing pixels. Treat every reading as a working approximation for comparing colors and planning mixtures, not a Munsell Book chip.
The hue pages and the tree
The Munsell Book of Color is bound as constant-hue pages: on each, value rises up the page and chroma grows away from the neutral column. The 40 pages here hold all 2,734 chips of the renotation data, 2.5 hue steps apart. Their outlines are uneven because the strongest chroma any surface color can reach changes with hue and value: 5Y reaches its strongest, /20, at value 9, while 5PB reaches /20 at value 4 and falls to /2 at value 9.
Put a page beside its complement across the neutral axis and you have a slice of the Munsell tree. The printable version has one slice per complementary pair; printers and papers shift color, so use it to study relationships, not to match paint to a printed chip.
Using it at the easel
Convert the hex values of the light and the shadow of one form and compare the two notations; the changes in value, chroma and hue are the steps your mixture has to make. To see those attributes across a whole photo rather than one color at a time, the hue value chroma separator splits an image into value, hue and chroma views.
Further reading
The page below goes further into the ideas the Munsell Color Converter works with, and opens on the site named beside it.
- Color theory for painters, in plain language (ArtisticMasterclass.com)
Tips from a working artist
From Sujith Puthran, artist and founder: what I actually do at the easel.
Compare, don't absolutize: the difference between two readings is far more reliable than either reading alone.
Use value readings to calibrate your eye: guess the value of a passage first, then convert and check.
Find your color's page and look up and down its column: those are lighter and darker colors of the same hue and chroma.
Why your picture stays on your device
The Munsell is a program your browser downloads and runs by itself. When you choose a picture, the browser reads it from your files and does the work on your own phone or computer; no copy is sent to this site or to anyone else, and what you export is saved straight from the browser. That is why there is nothing to upload and nothing to sign up for. The privacy page says what the site does collect.
Questions about the Munsell Color Converter
The 5 questions below cover how a notation reads, where the data comes from, and the limits of a screen.
Reading notation
What does a notation like 5R 6/4 mean?
A notation like 5R 6/4 means hue 5R, Munsell value 6 and chroma 4. Hue 5R is the center of the red family on the 100-step hue circle; Munsell value 6 is a step lighter than middle value on the 0–10 Munsell value scale; chroma 4 is four steps away from neutral gray, a muted red.
The data
Where does the underlying data come from?
The underlying data comes from the Munsell renotation published by Newhall, Nickerson and Judd in 1943. The 1943 data is used as distributed by the Rochester Institute of Technology's Munsell Color Science Laboratory, the same dataset behind the colour Python library and the munsellinterpol R package. The source is logged in the project's data/SOURCES.md, last checked on September 25, 2026.
How accurate is the conversion?
The conversion is accurate against the colour-science library, the reference Python implementation: published chips come back exactly and colors between chips agree within about 0.1 of a hue step and 0.12 of a chroma step. It is still an interpolation of 1943 data, not a measurement: screen calibration and viewing conditions add their own error.
Limits
Why can't my screen show some Munsell chips?
Munsell chroma extends beyond what sRGB monitors can produce, and some chips in the renotation data lie outside the sRGB gamut. When a chip exceeds the gamut, the tool clamps the swatch to a displayable color and says so in a note, rather than showing a wrong color silently.
Is Munsell value the same as the 1–10 value scale?
No, Munsell value is not the same as the 1–10 value scale. Munsell value runs from 0 (ideal black) to 10 (ideal white) and is calculated from luminance with the ASTM D1535-08 polynomial. The artist's 1–10 scale used by the value tools on this site puts 1 at the darkest dark and 10 at the white of the paper, and is derived from OKLab lightness.
- Munsell renotation data: rit-mcsl.org/MunsellRenotation/real.dat · checked 2026-09-25
Type a hex color, pick one from a photo or browse the hue pages, then send the chip to the mixer.
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