Inspect Gold (#FFD700) in HEX, RGB, HSL, LCH and OKLCH, check its contrast, and copy the value you need.
Gold
#FFD700
Black text reads best on this background, at 14.97:1.
Gold is one of the 148 CSS named colors, and resolves to #FFD700 in every browser. In numbers that is rgb(255, 215, 0) and hsl(51, 100%, 50%). Perceptually it is a very light, vivid color: OKLCH puts its lightness at 89% and its chroma at 0.182. It sits in the yellows at 95 degrees of OKLCH hue, and reads as a warm color.
White text only reaches 1.4:1 here, so black text is the safer pairing at 14.97:1. Because it is this light, Gold works best as a page or card background with dark text over it.
The closest CSS named colors to Gold, measured with CIEDE2000, are Yellow (#FFFF00), Khaki (#F0E68C), GoldenRod (#DAA520). If Gold is not quite right, those are the nearest keywords to try before reaching for a custom value.
HEX
#FFD700
RGB
rgb(255, 215, 0)
HSL
hsl(51, 100%, 50%)
HWB
hwb(51 0% 0%)
CMYK
cmyk(0%, 16%, 100%, 0%)
LAB
lab(87.47 2.91 86.55)
LCH
lch(87.47 86.6 88.07)
OKLCH
oklch(88.68% 0.1822 95.33)
WCAG asks for 4.5:1 between body text and its background. On #FFD700 white text measures 1.4:1 and black text 14.97:1, so black clears it and white does not.
White text on Gold
WCAG 2.2
1.4:1
APCA
Lc 21
Fails AA body text
Fails AAA body text
Fails AA large text
Black text on Gold
WCAG 2.2
14.97:1
APCA
Lc 84
Passes AA body text
Passes AAA body text
Passes AA large text
Check Gold against any other color in the contrast checker.
Gold sits at 89% OKLCH lightness. Holding its hue and chroma and moving only that value carries it up to #FFF9E0 and down to #080600, which keeps the family recognizable instead of letting it drift toward gray the way a plain HSL ramp does.
#FFDE5A
20% lighter
#FFE683
40% lighter
#FFECA4
60% lighter
#FFF3C3
80% lighter
#FFF9E0
100% lighter
#C6A700
20% darker
#907900
40% darker
#5E4E00
60% darker
#302700
80% darker
#080600
100% darker
Build a full accessible scale from #FFD700 in the shade generator.
Hues rotated around #FFD700 in OKLCH, then pulled back into the sRGB gamut. Each swatch is labelled with the nearest CSS named color so you have a keyword to start from.
Gold sits at 95 degrees. Rotating it a half turn lands on 275 degrees, the hue directly opposite. It is the strongest pairing you can make without changing lightness, and the one most likely to vibrate if you use both at full chroma.
The neighbors of Gold at 65 and 125 degrees. They stay close enough to read as the same family, which is what you want for hover states, secondary surfaces and gradients.
95, 215 and 335 degrees divide the wheel into thirds. Balanced enough to carry a whole palette without one color dominating the other two.
Instead of the complement at 275 degrees, this pair flanks it at 245 and 305. You keep most of the contrast of a complementary pairing while losing the harshness.
Explore more combinations around Gold on the color wheel.
The biggest shift is under tritanopia, where #FFD700 reads as #FFB496, 30.4 CIEDE2000 units away. If Gold is the only thing marking a state or a series, roughly one viewer in twelve will miss it.
Protanopia
#FFC600
Deuteranopia
#FFD806
Tritanopia
#FFB496
Achromatopsia
#D0D0D0
The nearest CSS keywords to #FFD700, ranked by perceptual distance rather than by how close their hex digits happen to look.