/tui-design

Solarized (Dark, Light): palette → token map

Sections — read only the line range you need (sed -n 'START,ENDp' on this file, or Read with offset/limit):

• At a glance · L15–25 — variant ids, appearance, base/text/accent hex, license and sources.
• Palette (official hex) · L27–67 — the exact official hex of a named palette entry.
• Author's role rules · L69–71 — the scheme author's own rules for what each colour is for.
• Token map · L73–134 — the palette entry, hex and contrast behind each semantic token (tier 1 and tier 2).
• Contrast findings · L136–143 — which tokens fail a floor per variant, in truecolor, 16 and 256 colours.
• 16-color mode · L145–160 — the per-variant ansi16 overrides and their ratios.
• Quirks and discrepancy decisions · L162–168 — where sources disagree and which value was kept, light-theme limits.
• App ports · L170–177 — whether helix, lazygit, k9s, btop, yazi, gitui or Textual ship a port of this scheme.

Read this when a TUI uses Solarized and you need the exact palette entry, hex and contrast for each semantic token, the author's role rules, and the 16-color caveats. Token meanings: ../color-tokens.md. All schemes: ../color-schemes.md. Machine-readable: solarized-dark.json, solarized-light.json.

At a glance

Sources:

• Dark: palette https://github.com/altercation/solarized/blob/master/README.md#the-values; terminal https://github.com/solarized/xresources/blob/master/Xresources.dark; role spec https://github.com/altercation/solarized/blob/master/README.md#usage--development.
• Light: palette https://github.com/altercation/solarized/blob/master/README.md#the-values; terminal https://github.com/solarized/xresources/blob/master/Xresources.light; role spec https://github.com/altercation/solarized/blob/master/README.md#usage--development.

Palette (official hex)

ANSI 0–15 (terminal slots, in order black … bright white):

Author's role rules

Source: README "Usage & Development": "four monotones form the core values (with an optional fifth for emphasized content)"; dark: "the normal relationship for background and body text is base03:base0 (please note that body text is not base00)... text can be highlighted using a combination of base02:base1... simply inverted in the case of a light background." base01 = comments/secondary content (dark), base1 = emphasis. The eight accents are identical in both modes and defined with equal lightness, so none reaches 4.5:1 on base3.

Token map

Cell = palette name, hex, contrast. Contrast is vs bg.base (for bg tokens it shows the step from the base), selection.fg is vs selection.bg, fg.on-accent is the lowest ratio over the accent and status fills. FAIL = below the contrast floor. → token = unmapped tier-2 token resolved through its fallback; derived = computed hex (see Basis).

Tier 1 (always mapped)

Tier 2

Derived hex values (computed, not palette entries; blend(a, b, α) = a composited over b at opacity α):

• Dark: bg.stripe = #00262f = see provenance
• Light: bg.stripe = #f5efde = see provenance

Contrast findings

Rule for failures: the official mapping is kept unless the palette offers a same-role entry that passes (those swaps are listed in Basis). Where a status color fails, never rely on it alone: pair it with a glyph and a word (see ../color-tokens.md).

16-color mode

Per-theme ansi16 overrides of the _tokens.json defaults (spec = slot [attrs]; ratio vs the terminal background in that mode):

Quirks and discrepancy decisions

• Terminal slots: solarized/xresources (same ANSI assignment in dark and light): 8 = base03 (= background, invisible), 9 = orange, 10-12/14 = monotones base01/base00/base0/base1, 13 = violet, 15 = base3. ansi16 overrides route faint text and borders to slot 10 (base01). (Dark)
• Discrepancy: altercation iterm2 files use color-managed values (bg #001e27); kept the canonical README/xresources hex. (Dark)
• Solarized has two text tones per mode: body base0 (4.75:1) and secondary base01 (2.79:1). fg.muted and fg.faint are both base01 and fail their floors; use fg.title (base1) for emphasis to keep hierarchy. (Dark)
• Terminal slots: solarized/xresources (identical ANSI assignment to dark): 8 = base03 (darkest, not faint), 10-12/14 = monotones. (Light)
• Body text base00 on base3 is 4.13:1 (spec pairing) and fails 4.5:1; no same-role tone passes. No accent reaches 4.5:1 on base3. (Light)

App ports

O = official (scheme org or scheme repo extras), B = bundled in the app repo, C = community repo, - = none found (checked 2026-10).