Here are some common colors:

• amarillo — yellow
• anaranjado — orange
• azul — blue
• blanco — white
• dorado — golden
• gris — gray
• marrón — brown
• negro — black
• púrpura — purple
• rojo — red
• rosado — pink
• verde — green

Colors in the two languages don't always match up exactly. "Brown," in particular, can also be expressed by castaño, moreno or pardo, depending on the shade and what is being described. Morado also is commonly used for "purple."

As does English, Spanish also allows numerous nouns to be used as colors. However, the way in which they are used as colors varies depending on the region and the preferences of the speaker. For example, the word café means "coffee" and, as in English, can be used to describe a shade of brown. Possible ways to describe a coffee-colored shirt (camisa) include camisa de color café, camisa color de café, and camisa color café.

Here are some nouns that are commonly used in this way as colors, although numerous others can be used:

• beige, beis — beige
• cereza — cherry-colored
• chocolate — chocolate-colored
• esmerelda — emerald
• grana — dark red
• humo — smoky
• lila — lilac
• malva — mauve
• mostaza — mustard-colored
• naranja — orange
• oro — gold
• paja — straw-colored
• rosa — pink
• turquesa — turquoise
• violeta — violet

Note for intermediate students: When using colors derived from nouns, it isn't unusual for speakers to omit the word color (or color de or de color), so that a mustard-colored house would be una casa mostaza. When a noun is used in such a way, it is often still treated as a noun rather than an adjective, so it doesn't change form as adjectives typically do. (Some grammarians consider nouns used in this way to be invariable adjectives, that is, adjectives that don't change for number or gender). Thus "mustard-colored houses" would be casas mostaza rather than casas mostazas (although the latter might also be heard).

The more often a noun is used as a color, the more likely it is to be treated as a regular adjective. For example, rosa ("pink") is sometimes preferred to rosado for "pink," so both casas rosas and casas rosa are used, the choice depending on the region and the speaker. More information on this phenomenon is available in a separate lesson on invariable adjectives.