Different possible methods for generating a colour randomly in JS
Prakhar Tandon
Posted on December 18, 2021
In this post, I will be summarising several possible methods for generating a colour randomly in JavaScript.
So, Save this article !
As you might be aware of how colours are represented, i.e, Hexadecimal code with a '#' prefix --> #RRGGBB
The code for Black --> #000000
and for white --> #ffffff
Hence higher the values, more the colour will be lighter and vice-versa.
Here's the different methods:
- Method 1 In this approach, simply take a string of all possible hexadecimal characters, then choose from it randomly and concatenate them to form a 6 digit hex code.
const s = "0123456789ABCDEF";
function getRandomColor()
{
let col = "#";
let temp =0;
for(let i=0;i<6;++i)
{
temp = Math.floor( Math.random() * s.length ); // generates number between 0-15
col = col + s[temp];
}
return col;
}
for generating lighter/Darker colours only, we can use sLight or sDark respectively.
const sLight="789ABCDEF";
const sDark="01234567";
-
Method 2
Similar to the first one but here instead of predefined string, we can use
toString(16)
to convert to HexaDecimal.
function getRandomColor(){
let color = "#";
for(let i=0;i<6;++i)
color += (Math.floor( Math.random() * 16 ).toString(16) );
return color;
}
- Method 3 We can use the following ES6 approach :
const getRandomHex = from => to => () =>
Math.floor(Math.random() * (to - from) + from).toString(16);
const getRangedRandomColor = from => to => () =>
`#${[...Array(6)].map(getRandomHex(from)(to)).join("")}`;
const getRandomColor = getRangedRandomColor(0x0)(0xf);
const getRandomColorLight = getRangedRandomColor(0x7)(0xf);
const getRandomColorDark = getRangedRandomColor(0x0)(0x7);
Thanks to @lukeshiru for this one, and you can find the detailed explaination for this in the comments section of my previous article here
- Method 4
function getRandomColor() {
function c() {
var hex = Math.floor(Math.random()*256).toString(16);
return ("0"+String(hex)).substr(-2); // pad with zero
}
return "#"+c()+c()+c();
}
substr(-2) means take last two characters of the string.
- Method 5 This one is a great one liner for the same I found on StackOverflow.
function getRandomColor() {
return '#'+(Math.random().toString(16)+'00000').slice(2,8);
}
Well these were some of my picks, if you want to dive in more, you can have a look at this thread on StackOverFlow.
You can save this article for future references and comment down your opinions as well !
Posted on December 18, 2021
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