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RGB colors are selected by 3 selectors: Red, Green, and Blue. Each of these can be between $0$ and $255$.

So (and I'm sure this is some kind of permutation but I can't put my finger on the actual math involved) I was wondering exactly how many choices this is, and what is the math that goes along with it.

[0-255],[0-255],[0-255]

EXs:

0,5,2

52,215,65

etc etc

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  • $\begingroup$ Are you asking how many "colors" you can specify using 256 values per color channel? $\endgroup$
    – user251257
    Commented Mar 22, 2016 at 18:46
  • $\begingroup$ There are $256^3$ possible choices, that is, $2^{24}$. $\endgroup$
    – André Nicolas
    Commented Mar 22, 2016 at 19:02

1 Answer 1

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The answer is quite simply $$256 \cdot 256 \cdot 256 = 256^3=16777216$$

Edit: $256$, not $255$. Need to include $0$.

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    $\begingroup$ Be careful, though. Because the range for each color RGB is $[0,255]$, there are $256$ choices for each. $\endgroup$
    – Mike Pierce
    Commented Mar 22, 2016 at 18:47
  • $\begingroup$ Yeah, my mistake, I realised as soon as I posted $\endgroup$
    – J. Bush
    Commented Mar 22, 2016 at 18:47
  • $\begingroup$ That's so interesting to me because a lot of color pickers make it so you can click to select, each of those little boxes have 16 million choices, and that's insane. $\endgroup$
    – GrumpyCrouton
    Commented Mar 22, 2016 at 18:56

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