Color or colour?
In American English write color; in British and Commonwealth English, colour. color is a noun meaning “The spectral composition of visible light”; colour is a noun meaning “Commonwealth and Ireland standard spelling of color”. In written English (wordfreq, 2021 data) color is about 2.6 times as common as colour.
What is the difference between color and colour?
| color | colour | |
|---|---|---|
| Part of speech | noun, adjective, verb | noun, adjective, verb |
| Meaning | The spectral composition of visible light A particular set of visible spectral compositions, perceived or named as a class USConveying color, as opposed to shades of gray | Commonwealth and Ireland standard spelling of color |
| Example | Humans and birds can perceive color | none recorded |
| Forms | colors | colours |
| Pronunciation | /ˈkʌl.ə/ /ˈkʌl.ə(ɹ)/ [ˈkʰʌl.ə(ɹ)] | not recorded |
| Region | US | Commonwealth |
| In writing | 81 times per million words | 31 times per million words |
Sources: color and colour in the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Every current meaning of color and colour
color
- 1
The spectral composition of visible light
Humans and birds can perceive color
- 2
USConveying color, as opposed to shades of gray
Color television and movies were considered a great improvement over black and white
- 3
USTo give something color
We could color the walls red
- 4
A particular set of visible spectral compositions, perceived or named as a class
Most languages have names for the colors black, white, red, and green
- 5
USTo cause (a pipe, especially a meerschaum) to take on a brown or black color, by smoking
- 6
Hue as opposed to achromatic colors (black, white and grays)
The accident victim's face was white, drained of all color
- 7
USTo apply colors to the areas within the boundaries of a line drawing using colored markers or crayons
My kindergartener loves to color
- 8
These hues as used in color television or films, color photographs, etc (as opposed to the shades of grey used in black-and-white television)
This film is broadcast in color
colour
- 1
Commonwealth and Ireland standard spelling of color
- 2
Commonwealth and Ireland standard spelling of color
- 3
Commonwealth and Ireland standard spelling of color
Source: the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); obsolete, archaic, dialect and rare senses left out.
Which is more common, color or colour?
color appears 81 times per million words; colour 31 times per million words.
color 81 times per million wordscolour 31 times per million words
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How many people search color vs colour?
“color vs colour” is searched about 2,400 times a month on Google and 150 on Bing in the United States. Google counts close variants of a query together (“colour vs color”, “color or colour”).
Sources: Google Ads keyword data through DataForSEO and Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, the average month from September 2025 to August 2026.