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Rust Color Palettes

Twelve rust palettes with hex codes — generate endless more with the free tool below.

#91341d · #7b561e · #941438 · #28a9a5 · #1a4d84

#82271c · #93691f · #ab2b42 · #1bc0a7 · #18598b

#cb3715 · #816a18 · #c21924 · #1b94a1 · #1174c0

#ba2a17 · #ac8011 · #8c223c · #16aca2 · #205488

#82391c · #c97618 · #a51d31 · #109e97 · #125097

#a02613 · #9c5e1c · #971737 · #23958b · #1385c3

#892f1f · #915f21 · #891534 · #17c4b6 · #1366b9

#c84a14 · #c47c17 · #841525 · #1db9b1 · #13509a

#c14615 · #805c1e · #9e2440 · #18b9b6 · #1b6da7

#b1432b · #a86d24 · #982538 · #10b2a2 · #1963a3

#96420d · #986c25 · #b30f1f · #26a6a4 · #135496

#9f3819 · #996914 · #941026 · #289f9b · #1c4b92

Want more? Generate unlimited rust palettes, or anchor one on your own base color.

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Using a rust palette

Rust is iron oxide as a color: a red-brown darker and redder than terracotta, with none of desert’s bleaching — the shade of a bridge girder or a weathering-steel facade. Its accents here land on teal and steel blue, the cold-metal counterparts oxidation actually forms against, and that warm-corrosion-on-cool-industry tension is most of the theme’s appeal. Workwear, tool brands, breweries, and hardware-minded editorial use rust for weathered credibility, and unlike autumn’s palette it carries no calendar; oxidation is not a season. It is dark enough to serve as a heading color on cream — a genuine advantage over brighter oranges, which never get to touch type. Keep true reds out of the layout, though: beside a saturated red, rust stops reading as material and starts reading as a red that failed.

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Frequently asked questions

Is rust just dark orange?

It is orange plus history: darker, redder, and browner than fresh orange, the hue of oxidized iron. That materiality is the appeal — rust reads as weathered and durable where bright orange reads as new plastic.

What colors go with rust?

Teal and steel blue, as in this scheme’s accents — cool metal against warm oxide — plus cream, charcoal, and olive in supporting roles. Rust beside a true red loses its material quality, so keep pure reds out.

Does a rust palette read as autumn?

It borrows autumn’s warmth without the calendar lock. Rust is a material color — oxidation happens in every month — so it anchors year-round identities comfortably; just avoid stacking it with mustard and oxblood if you want to stay out of the harvest aisle.