Colour-vision deficiency friendly Periodic Table of Elements including atomic numbers, element symbols and names, atomic mass, electron configuration, and period and group. Lanthanoids and Actinoids are shown. Coloured are the different element flavours or, alternatively, phases of individual elements at room temperature, element numbers, and year of discovery.
Data are based on the NIST Atomic Spectra Database and the Royal Society of Chemistry’s periodic table, which compile experimentally verified and theoretically predicted ground-state configurations.
The Scientific colour map ‘batlow‘ is used to represent individual groups of elements to all, including colour-blind, readers.
- Creator: Fabio Crameri
- Original version: 08.01.2022
- This version: 02.04.2026
- License: Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0)
- Specific citation: This graphic by Fabio Crameri from Crameri et al. (2022) is available via the open-access s-ink.org repository.
- Related reference: Crameri, F., G.E. Shephard, and E.O. Straume (2022, Pre-print), Effective high-quality science graphics from s-Ink.org, EarthArXiv, https://doi.org/10.31223/X51P78
- Alternative-content versions
- Alternative-colouring versions
- Alternative-font versions
- Transparent-background versions
- Vector-format versions
- Light & dark background versions
- Colour-vision deficiency friendly
- Readable in black&white
Faulty or missing link? – Please report them via a reply below!
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thank you!
What font is this?
Hi Joey, thanks for the interest! The typeface in the lead image is Museo Sans, but it is also provided using Helvetica.
What is the font used here?
Hi Chirac, thanks for the interest! The typeface in the lead image is Museo Sans, but it is also provided using Helvetica.
Why does it indicate that some elements are unknown?
Thank you, Jayesh, for asking. All elements up to 118 are “known”, but their chemistry might still be mysterious: we still only have theoretical predictions of the chemical properties of heavy elements, such as Tennessine. Elements 119 and beyond are not yet discovered, but researchers are hunting for them.
If you have suggestions for updates to the latest state of knowledge, please do not hesitate to let us know!
I know it is difficult to get colours that all colourblind people will see correctly as we are all different. Case in point, I see alkali, transition, alkaline earth metals and lanthanide the same colour. If I may make a suggestion, I see 2 solutions. First make the table partially interactive so when I change the colour of say 3 Li, all other of same colour will change to my choice and so on. The purpose of colour is to make the elements identifiable so if interactive is too complicated, then using blank or white background between categories would make it easier. eg: if 3 Li is dark blue with the whole column also dark blue, then 4 Beryllium and the column under it would be white and 21 Scandium with all its category members would be say lime and so on. Just a thought. Great work and if you decide to make a new table, can the electron configuration be added in small characters above the symbol.
Thank you, Ray, for your feedback. Yes, darker colours tend to be harder to distinguish than lighter ones for us all. We appreciate your constructive suggestions:
1) The interactive solution is ideal for purely digital use cases provided the necessary tools are available. However, our goal is to create a graphic suitable for both digital and print environments making this option unsuitable.
2) If we understand correctly, you would mix up the existing colours to achieve more contrast between the ones next to each other. The problem we see with this suggestion is that it actually is easier to differentiate low-contrast colours when they are next to each other, rather than further away.
We will look into an additional version with a dedicated categorical colour palette that will work better, and add it to the package.
Overall, we hope s-ink helps with making figures more accessible for you too!
Electron configurations have now been added. – Thank you.