The first NHL sweater built on pink, or coral, as its base color belongs to the Florida Panthers. It came out of Hometown Remix, which the NHL and Fanatics unveiled on November 2, 2026, and which gave every club a special-edition alternate for 2026-27 (NHL.com and The Hockey News, 2026).
That jersey doesn't change anything in the palettes below. Each club is listed with its current primary palette, and alternates stay out of it.
Color codes need some caution too. HEX, RGB, CMYK and Pantone values for a single team color differ between directories, so I'd go with the team's own logo file or media guide as the reference.
What Are the Colors of Every NHL Team?
Red, blue, black and gold carry most of the palettes across the league's 32 teams, which sit in two conferences with two eight-team divisions each.
Primary color comes first in every table. Names follow a team's own wording where it publishes one (Union blue, Iron Range red, Rock Black). White trim shows up on every team, so it's listed only when a team names it. Everything here is current as of November 2026.
Atlantic Division
Boston, Detroit, Montreal and Toronto, four of the Original Six, all play in this division.
| Team | Primary color | Secondary and accents |
|---|---|---|
| Boston Bruins | Black | Gold |
| Buffalo Sabres | Royal blue | Gold |
| Detroit Red Wings | Red | White |
| Florida Panthers | Red | Navy blue, gold |
| Montreal Canadiens | Red | Blue, white |
| Ottawa Senators | Red | Black, gold |
| Tampa Bay Lightning | Blue | Black, white |
| Toronto Maple Leafs | Blue | White |
Detroit and Toronto get by on two colors each. Ottawa and Florida have the most going on.
Metropolitan Division
Carolina, New Jersey and Washington lead with red, which makes 3 of the 8 teams. Columbus and both New York clubs lead with blue.
| Team | Primary color | Secondary and accents |
|---|---|---|
| Carolina Hurricanes | Red | Black, silver |
| Columbus Blue Jackets | Union blue | Goal red, capital silver |
| New Jersey Devils | Red | Black |
| New York Islanders | Royal blue | Orange |
| New York Rangers | Blue | Red |
| Philadelphia Flyers | Orange | Black |
| Pittsburgh Penguins | Black | Gold |
| Washington Capitals | Red | Navy blue |
Orange appears twice, as the Flyers' primary and the Islanders' accent. Silver belongs only to Carolina and Columbus.
Central Division
| Team | Primary color | Secondary and accents |
|---|---|---|
| Chicago Blackhawks | Red | Black |
| Colorado Avalanche | Burgundy | Steel blue, silver |
| Dallas Stars | Victory green | Black, silver |
| Minnesota Wild | Forest green | Iron Range red, harvest gold, Minnesota wheat |
| Nashville Predators | Gold | Navy blue |
| St. Louis Blues | Blue | Yellow |
| Utah Mammoth | Rock black | Mountain blue, salt white |
| Winnipeg Jets | Polar night blue | Aviator blue, silver, red |
Minnesota has the biggest palette in the division, with four colors named beyond white.
Utah has the newest one. Rock Black, Mountain Blue and Salt White debuted in 2024-25 and stuck around when the team became the Mammoth on May 7, 2025 (NHL.com).
St. Louis made the biggest recent move, shifting its home jersey to a lighter, brighter blue for 2025-26, according to St. Louis Public Radio.
Pacific Division
Not every Pacific team sticks with red and black. Seattle and Vancouver both build on blue (Vancouver adds green), and Vegas goes with gold and steel gray.
| Team | Primary color | Secondary and accents |
|---|---|---|
| Anaheim Ducks | Orange | Black, gold |
| Calgary Flames | Red | Gold |
| Edmonton Oilers | Royal blue | Orange |
| Los Angeles Kings | Black | Silver |
| San Jose Sharks | Deep Pacific teal | Black, orange |
| Seattle Kraken | Deep sea blue | Ice blue, shadow blue, red alert |
| Vancouver Canucks | Blue | Green |
| Vegas Golden Knights | Gold | Steel gray, red, black |
Official Color Codes: HEX, RGB, CMYK and Pantone
Screens run on HEX and RGB. Print runs on CMYK and Pantone.
What each format does
A HEX code is six characters, like #C8102E, and it's what most web work uses. RGB says the same thing with three numbers from 0 to 255, one each for red, green and blue.
Print is messier. CMYK gives percentages of cyan, magenta, yellow and black ink, and most print shops work from it. Pantone skips the mixing and points to a numbered ink chip such as PMS 186 C, where the C suffix marks the coated-paper version.
A print job that needs an exact team color usually names a Pantone chip rather than a mix. The chip is a fixed ink, while process printing builds the color from four overlapping inks.
Not every team publishes a print build, so the CMYK builds circulating online are often converted from the Pantone chip. That's one reason the same color carries different numbers on different sites.
Why sources disagree on the same color
The Ottawa Senators show the problem well. Every source below gives their red the same chip, PMS 186 C, and yet the HEX value changes from site to site.
| Source | Red HEX | Gold HEX | Gold Pantone |
|---|---|---|---|
| usteamcolors | #C8102E | #C69214 | PMS 1245 C |
| teamcolorcodes (current) | #DA1A32 | #B79257 | PMS 465 C |
| teamcolorcodes (2007-2020 logo) | #C52032 | #C2912C | PMS 1245 C |
| Design Your Way directory (2026) | #C8102E | #B9975B | PMS 465 C |
The CMYK build for that red varies too, at 2/100/85/6 on usteamcolors and 8/100/88/1 on teamcolorcodes' current entry.
The gold splits along Pantone lines. usteamcolors and the 2007-2020 entry sit on PMS 1245 C, while the current teamcolorcodes entry and Design Your Way use PMS 465 C.
Design Your Way even disagrees with itself. Its 2026 directory lists #C8102E and #B9975B, but its dedicated Ottawa page lists #DA1A32 and #B79257.
usteamcolors states that its HEX values were checked against the SVG logo on the Senators' website. When two directories disagree, the team's own logo file or media guide settles it.
When a rebrand makes a code obsolete
Rebrands move the target. St. Louis Public Radio described the Blues' 2025-26 home jersey as a lighter, brighter blue than the darker royal the team wore before, so a blue code captured earlier no longer matches the primary jersey.
Which Colors Do NHL Teams Use Most?
Blue shows up most often, with red close behind. Black and gold trail those two.
Going by the division tables above, blue appears in 17 team palettes (navy, royal and steel blue included) and red in 16 (burgundy included). Black turns up on 14 teams, gold or yellow on 11, and silver or gray on 7.
Colors only a few teams use
Past those, the palette thins out fast.
San Jose is the only team in the tables with teal in its colors. Colorado stands alone on burgundy, a shade of red no other team uses.
Orange is more common than either, with the Flyers, Ducks, Oilers, Islanders and Sharks (5 teams) all using it. Green is rarer, used by the Stars, Wild and Canucks (3 teams). No current palette in the tables uses purple.
How the count was made
Every named color counts once per team, and shades roll up into their family. White is left out because every team uses it. Navy, royal, Union blue and steel blue all count as blue, and burgundy counts as red.
Accent colors named in the tables are included, but unnamed trim isn't. Count a trim color differently and the totals shift, so read them as a tally and not an official figure.
Where NHL Team Colors Come From
Most franchises never published a rationale for their colors, so only the documented cases appear here. A few were borrowed from a business or a city, some come from the landscape, and Winnipeg's traces back to a military unit.
Colors borrowed from a business or a city
The Boston Bruins took brown and yellow in 1924 from the First National Stores grocery chain, which was headed by team founder Charles Adams. Black replaced brown in 1935-36.
Pittsburgh played in blue until January 1980, then switched to black and gold to match the Pirates, the Steelers and the city flag.
The Bruins protested the switch, claiming rights to black and gold. The NHL allowed it anyway.
Colors taken from the landscape
Toronto announced blue and white on September 27, 1927, after first planning red and white.
Conn Smythe later said blue stood for Canadian skies and white for snow. The same colors ran on the trucks of his gravel and sand business.
Utah's May 7, 2025 release attached a meaning to each of its colors. Rock Black is the darkness of night in the mountains. Salt White covers snow on the peaks and the salt flats, and Mountain Blue stands for winter sports and clear skies.
Pairing each color with a meaning is standard brand guidelines practice, and Utah published it alongside the launch.
Colors tied to a military unit
Winnipeg revealed its current logo and colors on July 22, 2011, built around the Royal Canadian Air Force.
The primary logo follows an RCAF roundel and carries a CF-18 Hornet silhouette, a nod to Winnipeg's 17 Wing. The main palette is blue and silver.
For most other franchises no origin was ever published, and fan theories about them aren't evidence.
NHL Teams That Changed Colors Since 2024
Utah reset its look in June 2024, and St. Louis and Boston followed in June 2025. Utah's May 2025 rename to the Mammoth brought new logos but kept the palette, so only Utah and St. Louis changed the palette itself.
| Team | Date | What changed | Palette afterward |
|---|---|---|---|
| Utah | June 13, 2024 | New identity after the move from Arizona | Rock black, mountain blue, salt white |
| St. Louis Blues | June 24, 2025 | Home blue shifted to the 1967 shade, Blue Note cut from three colors to two | Blue and yellow |
| Boston Bruins | June 25, 2025 | Logo colors swapped by jersey, less gold on the sleeves | Black and gold |
St. Louis and its disputed blue
Coverage of the rebrand can't agree on what to call the new blue.
The Hockey News, relaying the team's account, calls it the original blue and yellow first worn in 1967. St. Louis Public Radio goes with a cornflower blue that is lighter than the darker royal of recent years, and notes the royal jersey stays on as a third. Bleacher Report describes a royal blue and yellow palette, the first since 1984.
The argument is over the word "royal." Bleacher Report applies royal blue to the 1967-era shade, while Matrix Midwest says royal blue has been the primary color since 1984.
Directories split the same way. teamcolorcodes lists the Blues blue as PMS 287 C (#002F87), and Design Your Way lists PMS 285 C (#0072CE), a lighter chip.
Only the team's own logo file settles which one is current.
Boston: same palette, new balance
Boston kept black and gold, but the balance between them moved.
On the home black jersey the B is gold with black spokes, and on the road white one it flips to a black B with gold spokes.
The sleeves carry less gold, while the gloves gain gold detailing (Sports Illustrated and the Bruins). It's the club's first full-time uniform rebrand since 2007, according to 98.5 The Sports Hub.
Alternate and Special-Edition Jersey Colors
Alternates are where teams drop their palettes on purpose, and the 2026-27 Hometown Remix set pushed that further than any league-wide program before it.
Hometown Remix
The NHL and Fanatics unveiled all 32 jerseys on November 2, 2026, and 261 games will feature at least one team in its Remix uniform, 19 of them with both teams wearing one (NHL.com).
ESPN describes the program, for now, as a one-season run, though the NHL and Fanatics say they will evaluate fan response for future programs (CNBC). Fanatics has been the league's on-ice outfitter since 2024-25 under a 10-year contract.
| Team | Remix base color | Usual palette |
|---|---|---|
| Florida Panthers | Pink (coral) | Red, navy blue, gold |
| Boston Bruins | Brown | Black, gold |
| Los Angeles Kings | Royal purple | Black, silver |
| Chicago Blackhawks | Green | Red, black |
| Tampa Bay Lightning | Black, sky blue accents | Blue, black, white |
NHL.com says Florida's coral is a color never used before in the league, and The Hockey News describes the pink, or coral, base covering the front, back and sleeves. Boston's brown base echoes the brown and yellow the club wore when it launched in 1924.
Utah stayed closer to home, putting the U-Tusk logo on a Mountain Blue sweater (KUTV).
Third jerseys and outdoor games
Pittsburgh has a third jersey in "Pittsburgh Gold," a shade honoring Mario Lemieux's mid-1980s years, and wore it 11 times in 2025-26 (CBS Pittsburgh). Washington's red third is built on the 1990s Screaming Eagle logo and was unveiled September 15, 2025.
Outdoor games give teams a one-night license. Tampa Bay wore sky blue for the first time in the February 1, 2026 Stadium Series game against Boston, a color the team says stands for the Tampa sky.
Reverse Retro
Reverse Retro ran for two rounds and mixed logos, color schemes and uniform designs from different eras of each team's history, according to SportsLogos.Net.
Colorado's versions were the clearest case. One was a burgundy and white Quebec Nordiques jersey, and another used the colors of the Colorado flag.
The league wanted something different from Reverse Retro 1.0 and 2.0, NHL executive Brian Jennings told ESPN, and every Remix jersey was designed from scratch (NHL.com).
None of this changes a team's actual colors, only what it wears on a given night.
How to Use NHL Team Colors in a Design or Print Project
Start from the team's own logo file or media guide, then match the value to what the output needs. Directory tables are handy shortcuts, but they aren't sources.
- Decide the output first. Screen work takes HEX or RGB, and print takes a Pantone chip or a CMYK build.
- Locate the team's vector logo (SVG) or its media guide.
- Read the HEX from the logo file, or the Pantone chip from the media guide.
- Compare the value against a second directory, and keep the team's file when the two disagree.
- Convert only when the team publishes nothing in your format, and note which converter you used.
- Confirm the season. You want the current primary palette, not an alternate and not a pre-rebrand version.
usteamcolors cites its sources team by team: the Rangers' Playoff Media Guide (page 7), the Capitals' Media Guide (page 236) and the Sabres' Media Guide (page 57), each alongside the SVG logo on the team's website.
Web work rarely needs more than HEX, and a HEX to RGB converter covers tools that ask for RGB.
Where the method breaks
Print fails most often, because few teams publish a CMYK build. A Pantone to CMYK converter gives a starting mix, but different converters give different mixes.
Fabric adds its own problem. The Blues adjusted their 1967 blue slightly in 2025 to keep color consistent across jersey fabrics, so a screen code and a stitched jersey are not the same blue (The Hockey News). Directories also lag behind rebrands, and a color sampled from a JPEG has already drifted during compression.
Proof the color on the target stock before a full print run.
NHL Team Colors FAQ
Do NHL teams wear different colors at home and on the road?
Yes, most teams flip their base color between jerseys. Utah wears Rock Black at home and Salt White away, per its May 2025 release (NHL.com), and the Blues pair a blue home sweater with a white road one.
The Bruins go further and reverse their logo colors from one jersey to the other.
Can I use NHL team logos and colors on my own products?
Logos need permission. The terms of use on NHL club sites (the New Jersey Devils' version was last updated January 15, 2025) state that NHL and member club logos and marks are registered trademarks that may not be reproduced without the prior written consent of the NHL or the respective club.
For merchandise or paid work, ask the club first. This is general information, not legal advice.
What colors did former NHL teams like the Whalers use?
The Hartford Whalers wore blue, green and gray, and the Minnesota North Stars used green, yellow, white, gold and black, according to teamcolorcodes.
The Atlanta Thrashers had the longest list, with midnight blue, ice blue, Georgia bronze, Capitol copper, Peachtree gold and white.
What colors did the Arizona Coyotes use?
According to Design Your Way's 2026 directory, the Coyotes wore brick red and desert sand, a scheme that is no longer active.
The franchise formerly known as the Coyotes relocated ahead of 2024-25, and Utah introduced Rock Black, Mountain Blue and Salt White.
What to Re-Check Before Committing to a Team Color
NHL team colors need a re-check once each offseason, in July, before any code goes onto a permanent print run or site. Every identity change since 2024 was announced in May or June, ahead of the season it governed.
The cheapest order is to compare the team's current logo file with the stored values first. After that, rule out alternates and special editions, and re-pull HEX and Pantone only if the logo changed. The logo goes first because a changed crest is the one signal that makes every stored code suspect.
It does mean a recurring calendar task, and a code locked in September goes untested until the following July.
Once the values hold, setting up a print-ready file turns them into something a printer can run.
This position is verified as of November 6, 2026, and changes if the league begins publishing official team palettes.