What Is Tint & Shade Generator?

Updated

Tint & Shade Generator (maketintsandshades.com) is a free browser tool that takes one or more hex colors and generates a full ramp of tints (lighter) and shades (darker) from each. Its distinguishing feature is stated in its own description: the steps it produces match the output of Chrome DevTools, Sass, Less, and PostCSS. That makes it most useful when you need a color scale that stays consistent with what your build tooling or browser already generates, rather than an arbitrary gradient.

What it does

You enter at least one valid hex color, and the tool returns a set of lighter and darker variants of that color. The page accepts multiple colors at once — hex values separated by spaces — so you can build ramps for several brand colors in one pass.

Two controls shape the output:

  • Step count — choose 5, 10, or 20 steps, which sets how many tints and shades are generated per color.
  • Hashtag toggle — show or hide the # prefix on the hex values, useful depending on whether you're pasting into CSS or into a design tool.

There is also a color picker for choosing an input color visually instead of typing hex.

Output and export formats

The generator can present each palette in several formats, and the page includes an Export palettes section plus a Share link option.

Format What you get
Hex Plain hex values
#Hex Hex values with the # prefix
RGB RGB color values
CSS Ready-to-paste CSS
JSON Structured data for programmatic use

The Share link produces a shareable URL, so a palette you generate can be sent to a teammate or reopened later without re-entering the colors.

Who it's for

  • Frontend developers who need a tint/shade ramp that lines up with Sass, Less, PostCSS, or DevTools output, so the generated values don't drift from what the toolchain produces.
  • Design system maintainers filling out hover, active, and disabled states from a single base color.
  • Designers who want a quick, exportable scale in CSS or JSON without opening a full design application.

How to use it

  1. Enter one or more valid hex colors, separated by spaces, or pick a color with the color picker.
  2. Choose 5, 10, or 20 steps.
  3. Toggle hashtags on or off depending on your target format.
  4. Review the generated tints and shades.
  5. Export in the format you need (Hex, #Hex, RGB, CSS, or JSON), or copy the share link.

If nothing generates, the most common cause is an invalid or empty hex input — the page requires at least one valid hex color before it produces a palette.

Practical notes

The tool is a single-purpose utility: it generates and exports color scales, and it does not appear to offer accounts, saved projects, or team features beyond the shareable link. The site's own framing — matching DevTools, Sass, Less, and PostCSS output — is the main reason to choose it over a generic gradient generator, since consistency with your existing pipeline is the point.