Color Memory Matching Game
You saw it two seconds ago. Which of these four blues was it?
About Color Recall
Color Recall is a short memory test with an unusual twist: the thing you have to remember cannot be put into words. A large square of a single color fills the screen for a few seconds while a countdown bar runs. Then it vanishes and a row of swatches appears, one of which is the color you just saw. The others are close cousins, and your job is to tap the right one.
On the first levels the cousins are clearly different: you see four swatches, and the wrong ones are a noticeable step away from the real color. At the top levels there are five swatches, the look-alikes sit within a few units of the original, and the original is on screen for under two seconds. A round takes less than fifteen seconds, which makes it easy to play in a queue or between other tasks.
How to play
- Watch the color square for as long as the memorize bar runs. Do not try to name the color; look at it and hold the impression.
- When the swatches appear, tap the one that matches. On a keyboard you can press the number shown in the corner of each swatch.
- You have 10 seconds to choose. If the time runs out the round scores zero.
- After you answer, the correct swatch is highlighted and the original color is shown again next to it, so you can see how far off a wrong pick was.
A color appears for a few seconds. When it disappears, tap the swatch that matches it. The wrong ones are close cousins, so trust your first impression.
How scoring works
A correct pick scores 100. A wrong pick is not worth nothing: the game measures how far each swatch is from the real color in the CIELAB color space, which is built so that equal distances look equally different to the eye. If you chose the swatch closest to the truth among the wrong ones, you get up to 30 points; the farthest swatch earns 0. A timeout scores 0.
Difficulty works on two knobs. The distance between the real color and its look-alikes shrinks from about 32 units at the start to about 11 units at the end, and the viewing time shrinks from 3 seconds to 1.6 seconds. From level 6 upward a fifth swatch is added, which lowers the chance of a lucky guess. With the relaxed timer setting the viewing time is lengthened by 40 percent.
What it trains
This game exercises visual working memory for a single continuous feature. Unlike remembering a word or a number, you cannot rehearse a color verbally. You hold the sensory impression itself and compare it with a new one. Most people find that their memory for color is good at the level of a named category (a blue, a green) and much weaker at the level of a specific shade.
The skill is useful when you match paint, a fabric or a piece of clothing from memory, pick a matching part for a repair, or notice that two printed materials do not quite match. Designers, painters and photographers practice it professionally.
Tips for a higher score
- Describe the color to yourself in two numbers: how light it is and how colorful it is. A pale muted color and a deep vivid one are easier to tell apart than two shades of the same lightness.
- Do not stare at one point. Let your eyes rest on the middle of the square and take in the whole patch; a steady, relaxed look gives the cleanest impression.
- When the swatches appear, check lightness first. Many wrong swatches differ mostly in how light or dark they are, and that is the easiest dimension to compare.
- Trust your first impression. Switching between swatches makes the memory fade and replaces it with the swatch you looked at last.
- Play in similar lighting. A bright screen and a dim room, or the other way round, change how colors look, but they change both the memory and the swatches in the same way.
The idea behind it
The color space used for scoring, CIELAB, was standardized by the International Commission on Illumination (CIE) in 1976. Its aim is perceptual uniformity: a step of about 2 to 3 units is roughly the smallest difference an observer can notice side by side, and a step of 10 is clearly visible. The game uses this scale so that look-alikes at the same difficulty are comparably hard whichever hue they fall in.
Research on color memory has found that remembered colors tend to drift toward more typical, more saturated versions of the original and toward the nearest named category. This memory color effect is one reason why you may pick a swatch that is slightly more vivid than the one you saw. Keeping that drift in mind can help you pick the less saturated of two candidates.
Frequently asked questions
Why are some rounds easier than others?
Each round draws a random color and random look-alikes. Some colors sit in regions where your eye is more sensitive, and the layout of the wrong swatches changes how obvious the right one is.
Can I get partial credit for a wrong answer?
Yes, up to 30 points if your pick was the closest of the wrong swatches. A correct answer is always worth 100.
Which game trains something similar?
Hue Match asks you to recreate a remembered color with sliders, and Brightness tests the lightness dimension on its own.
Related games
Free, no account. Your best scores are saved on your device.