Skip to content
Browse
Library

Medium. Cream-colored broadsheet at golden hour.

  • Media
  • Light theme
  • 6 colors
  • 7 typefaces

Medium operates as a literary reading room translated to the web: a warm cream canvas (#f7f4ed) replaces the sterile white common to SaaS, making long-form prose feel like a printed page. The visual system is aggressively monochromatic — nearly every UI surface, text, and border sits in a narrow band of warm grays from #242424 to #6b6b6b — so the reader's attention goes entirely to content. The single brand gesture is the serif hero headline (GT Super at 120px, weight 400, tracking -0.055em), a deliberate anti-trend choice: a transitional book serif at display scale with whisper weight, not a bold geometric sans, signals 'we publish books, not software.' Buttons are full pills in near-black, the only solid ink on the page.

Visit medium.com
Screenshot of Medium
Captured from medium.com on October 11, 2026

Medium design system

Medium

Neutrals6

  • Supporting neutral for secondary UI, dividers, and muted labels. Do not promote it to the primary CTA color

  • Primary text, body copy, links, heading text — slightly warmer than pure black, sits comfortably on cream

  • Secondary text and default body color where slightly lighter than Ink is needed without losing contrast

  • Supporting neutral for secondary UI, dividers, and muted labels.

  • Page canvas, hero background, section backgrounds — the warm off-white that makes the entire interface feel printed rather than digital

  • Card surfaces, elevated panels, form inputs, and any surface that needs to lift off the cream canvas

Try a pairing

Pick any two colors from the palette to check whether text stays readable on top.

Aa

Paper White on Button Black

17.58 : 1 contrast

Background
Text
  • Body textPasses AA 4.5
  • Large textPasses AA 3
  • StrictPasses AAA 7

More DESIGN.md files. Same web, different personalities.