Discussing synonyms: colour, shade, hue, tint, tinge

These words all describe the appearance of things, resulting from the way in which they reflect light. 

colour: the appearance that things have, resulting from the way in which they reflect light. Red, green and blue are colours.

• I mostly like light colours?
• bright/dark/light colours

shade: a type or degree of a colour: a particular form of a colour especially when describing how light or dark it is. Sky blue is a shade of blue.

• The kitchen is painted an unusual shade of yellow/an unusual yellow shade.
• This hair colouring comes in several shades.

hue (literary or technical): a degree of lightness darkness, strength, etc. of a colour, more precisely, a colour or a shade of a colour

•  In the Caribbean waters there are fish of every hue.
• Her face took on an unhealthy, whitish hue.

tint: a shade or a small amount of a particular colour

• The paint we're using for the bathroom is white with a yellow tint.
•  The evening sky was deep pink, with tints of purple and red in it.

tinge: a very slight amount of a colour

• His hair is starting to show tinges of grey. 
• There was a pink tinge to the sky. 

 

tint or tinge?

You can say: a greenish tint/tinge or: a tinge of green but not: a tint of green. Tint is often used in the plural, but tinge is almost always singular.

Source: Oxford Dictionary

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Vivek Tripathi