What color does black and white make?
Equal parts black and white produce gray (#636363 (Dim Gray)). The blend is computed in the Oklab color space, so the steps between the two colors look evenly spaced to your eye rather than to the raw channel math.
#636363 - HEX
- #636363
- RGB
- rgb(99, 99, 99)
- HSL
- hsl(0, 0%, 39%)
- CMYK
- cmyk(0%, 0%, 0%, 61%)
color-mix(in oklab, #000000 50%, #ffffff) Black to White: every ratio
How much of each color you use moves the answer along the blend path. The perceptual midpoint is the 50/50 row; the others show what a 3:1 ratio does in either direction.
Lighter and darker versions
Tint the mix toward white or shade it toward black and you get a small palette that all clearly belongs to the same family:
#878787 Tint #aeaeae 50/50 mix #636363 Shade #212121 Darker #414141 Paint vs. screen: why the medium matters
Black and white are not colors of light — they are the extremes of brightness. Mixing them gives gray, and a perceptual 50/50 gray (what Oklab computes) is darker than the exact sRGB midpoint of 128, because your eye judges dark steps as larger than light ones.
About these two colors
Black #000000 — The absence of light on a screen; in paint, the darkest pigment that shades every mix.
White #ffffff — All visible wavelengths of light at once; in paint, the tint that lightens every mix.
Want to blend these with different colors entirely? Open the full color mixer, or convert #636363 to RGB, HSL or CMYK.
Related mixes
See all color mixes for the full directory.
Frequently asked questions
Does black and white make gray?
Yes — equal parts give gray, around #636363. The exact shade depends on your ratio: black-heavy mixes lean toward #222222 and white-heavy mixes toward #aeaeae.
What is the HEX code for black and white mixed?
A 50/50 perceptual mix is #636363 (Dim Gray). If you need it in CSS, the mixer above generates a ready-to-paste color-mix() snippet: color-mix(in oklab, #000000 50%, #ffffff).
What does black and white make in paint vs. on a screen?
Black and white are not colors of light — they are the extremes of brightness. Mixing them gives gray, and a perceptual 50/50 gray (what Oklab computes) is darker than the exact sRGB midpoint of 128, because your eye judges dark steps as larger than light ones.
How do I make the gray mix lighter or darker?
Mix the result with white to tint it — 50% white gives about #aeaeae — or with black to shade it, where 50% black gives about #212121. The strip above shows the full run from lighter to darker.