Hex to HSV Converter

About HEX and HSV color

HEX and HSV are two ways of naming the same color. A HEX code such as #FF6699 packs three bytes that give the red, green, and blue intensities a screen emits, each from 00 to FF (0 to 255 in decimal). It is compact and the native format for CSS and design files, but the digits say nothing intuitive about what the color looks like. HSV reorganizes the same information into three human-friendly axes: Hue (the position on the color wheel, 0 to 360 degrees), Saturation (how vivid versus gray, 0 to 100 percent), and Value (how bright, 0 to 100 percent).

The conversion is purely mathematical and lossless in one direction: every HEX code maps to exactly one HSV triple. The reverse can round differently, because HSV percentages are coarser than the 256 RGB steps. Designers reach for HSV when they want to nudge a color: drag the hue to shift it around the wheel, lower the saturation to mute it, or raise the value to lighten it, all without recomputing raw RGB bytes by hand.

HSV is closely related to HSL but not identical. Both share the hue axis, but HSV's third channel is Value (peak brightness of the brightest component) while HSL's is Lightness (the midpoint between brightest and darkest). At full value a color in HSV is the pure, most intense version of that hue; the same hue at 50 percent lightness in HSL would be the balanced mid-tone. Knowing which model a tool uses prevents surprises when a color looks washed out or over-bright after conversion.

How it works: the formula

The conversion normalizes each RGB channel to the 0 to 1 range, finds the max and min, and derives the three HSV components from them.

r,g,b = HEX channels / 255          (each now 0 to 1)
max = max(r,g,b)   min = min(r,g,b)   delta = max - min
Value      V = max
Saturation S = (max == 0) ? 0 : delta / max
Hue        H depends on which channel is the max:
  if max == r:  H = 60 x (((g - b) / delta) mod 6)
  if max == g:  H = 60 x (((b - r) / delta) + 2)
  if max == b:  H = 60 x (((r - g) / delta) + 4)
  if delta == 0 (gray): H = 0

• Value is simply the largest of the three normalized channels, so pure white (255,255,255) gives V = 100 percent and black gives 0.
• Saturation is the spread between brightest and darkest channel relative to the brightest. A gray (all channels equal) has zero spread, so S = 0.
• Hue picks the dominant channel and measures how the other two tilt around it, then scales to the 0 to 360 wheel. A pure gray has no dominant channel, so hue is undefined and reported as 0.

Worked example

Convert #FF6699 (the tool's sample) step by step.

1. Split the HEX: R = FF = 255, G = 66 = 102, B = 99 = 153.
2. Normalize: r = 1.0, g = 0.4, b = 0.6. Max = 1.0 (red), min = 0.4, delta = 0.6.
3. Value: V = max = 1.0, which is 100 percent.
4. Saturation: S = delta / max = 0.6 / 1.0 = 0.6, which is 60 percent.
5. Hue: red is max, so H = 60 x ((0.4 - 0.6) / 0.6 mod 6) = 60 x ((-0.333) mod 6) = 60 x 5.667 = 340 degrees.

Reference table: common colors in HEX and HSV

Hue, saturation, and value for familiar web colors.

Common pitfalls

• Confusing HSV with HSL. They share hue but differ on the third axis. Pasting an HSV value into an HSL field (or vice versa) shifts brightness noticeably. Confirm which model your design tool expects.
• Expecting hue to be meaningful for grays. Pure white, black, and gray have zero saturation, so their hue is mathematically undefined. This tool reports hue as 0 in that case, but any hue would be equally valid.
• Rounding drift on the round trip. HSV stores hue in whole degrees and S and V in whole percents, which is coarser than 256 RGB levels. Converting HEX to HSV and back can land one or two units off the original byte values.
• Dropping the leading hash or using shorthand. This tool accepts both 6-digit and 3-digit HEX with or without the leading #, but some parsers require the full #RRGGBB form.
• Assuming HSV degrees match a paint color wheel. HSV hue follows the additive RGB wheel (red at 0, green at 120, blue at 240), not the subtractive red-yellow-blue wheel used in traditional painting.

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Frequently asked questions