See haint blue on your porch ceiling before you paint: pick one of the pale porch-ceiling blues, or any color, and tap the ceiling of a sample porch or a photo of yours. Each blue shows how much light it reflects (LRV) and the closest Sherwin-Williams, Benjamin Moore and Behr paints. Your photo never leaves your device.
Pick a blue, then tap the ceiling
1Your porch
2Pick a porch-ceiling blue
3How it reads under the roof
LRV 62. Light (55 and up): it keeps a porch ceiling airy in the shade under the roof.
Closest paints
A screen shows each brand's digital version of a paint: check a real chip, held up under your porch roof, before you buy. We are not connected to any of these brands.
4Tap to paint
On a sample porch the ceiling is painted for you. On your own photo, tap an open part of the ceiling; if a beam or a fan splits it, tap each part. Missed a strip? Tap it too, or use the brush.
Quick answer: haint blue is the pale blue or blue-green painted on porch ceilings across the American South, a tradition tied to the Gullah Geechee people of the Lowcountry. The ten on the board are light, eight of them with an LRV (the share of light a color reflects) of 55 or more, because a porch ceiling gets no direct sun. Pick a blue above and tap the ceiling to see it on a sample porch or a photo of your own, with the closest Sherwin-Williams, Benjamin Moore and Behr paints.
How to use the haint blue visualizer
- Pick a porch. Start with the brick cottage or the gray farmhouse, or tap Upload or take a photo to use yours. Stand at the steps and tilt the phone up so the ceiling fills the top of the picture.
- Pick a blue. Haint blues holds ten pale porch-ceiling blues, from airy Haint Mist to Deep Haint. On a sample porch the ceiling changes at once. You can also type any color code.
- Read how it reads. Under the colors, the tool gives the blue’s LRV, what that means under a porch roof, and the closest Sherwin-Williams, Benjamin Moore and Behr paints, so you know what to ask for at the store.
- On your own photo, tap the ceiling. Tap an open part of it; a beam or a fan splits a ceiling into parts, so tap each one. For beadboard or tongue and groove, choose Boards. Compare shows the before and after.
Where haint blue comes from
The Historic Savannah Foundation, which runs Savannah’s Davenport House Museum, sums up the tradition: The Gullah Geechee legend says that evil spirits do not like water and painting spaces to look like water will keep them away. The color is said to have been originally based on the indigo grown in the region in the eighteenth century.
It is not one family’s story for every family. The same article quotes Louise Miller Cohen, founder of the Gullah Museum on Hilton Head Island: Haint blue was never mentioned in my family on Hilton Head Island
. And it tells how the museum checked its own legend: the blue paint in the Davenport House attic, long thought to date from the 1820s, was found by an architectural conservator to be the last layer of paint on the wood surface not the first
, from the 1890s or later
. Today the name covers a whole range of pale blues and blue-greens, which is why there is no single haint blue to buy.
Ten porch-ceiling blues and their closest paints
The blues on the board are our own names and colors. For each, the tool finds the nearest color in each brand’s own designer palette files by CIEDE2000, the color-difference formula the paint industry uses.
| Blue | Code | LRV | Closest Sherwin-Williams | Closest Benjamin Moore | Closest Behr |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Haint Mist | #D3E6E4 | 76 | SW 6497 Blue Horizon | CW-585 Ewing Blue | S450-1 Beach Foam |
| Pale Haint | #C4DFDD | 70 | SW 6484 Meander Blue | 673 Iced Green | S440-1 Sunken Pool |
| Robin Shell | #B9DBD8 | 66 | SW 6484 Meander Blue | 674 Spring Sky | M450-2 Tidewater |
| Lowcountry Sky | #B3D5DC | 62 | SW 6492 Jetstream | 2053-60 Tear Drop Blue | MQ4-55 Balboa |
| Marsh Glass | #B4D4C8 | 61 | SW 0063 Blue Sky | 639 Let It Rain | M430-3 Wintergreen Dream |
| Porch Breeze | #A9D0D2 | 58 | SW 6772 Cay | 723 Spring Rain | PPU13-10 Ocean Boulevard |
| Clear Sky Blue | #A8CFE3 | 58 | SW 6800 Something Blue | 794 Paradise View | M490-2 Carefree Sky |
| Indigo Wash | #B3C6D8 | 55 | SW 6527 Blissful Blue | CC-820 Airway | S530-2 Elevated |
| Tidewash | #A3C8CC | 53 | SW 9053 Agua Fría | 744 Indigo | PPU13-10 Ocean Boulevard |
| Deep Haint | #8DBCC3 | 46 | SW 6493 Ebbtide | CW-595 Chesapeake Blue | S460-3 Blue Echo |
A screen shows each brand’s digital version of a paint, so take the code to the store and hold a real chip up under your porch roof before you buy. We are not connected to any of these brands. One more find from Sherwin-Williams’ own palette file: one of its colors is simply called Porch Ceiling (SW 9063), a clear mid blue with an LRV of 54 by our maths.
Why a porch ceiling reads darker than the chip
A porch ceiling never gets the sun. It is lit only by the light the floor, the steps and the yard bounce up at it, so the same blue looks deeper overhead than on a chip held up in the sun. That is our reading of how the light works, not a paint maker’s rule, and it is why the classic haint blues are pale. The tool sorts every color into the light bands it uses everywhere: 55 and up keeps the ceiling airy, 20 to 54 reads deeper under the roof, under 20 is dark.
A deep porch, a porch facing north, or one shaded by trees gets even less light, so lean to the lighter end of the board. A shallow, sunny porch can carry a deeper blue like Tidewash or Deep Haint.
Three worked examples
A red brick cottage. The brick sample opens in Lowcountry Sky, LRV 62: a light blue that stays airy under the roof. The closest paints are Sherwin-Williams SW 6492 Jetstream, Benjamin Moore 2053-60 Tear Drop Blue and Behr MQ4-55 Balboa.
A deep, shady porch. Pick Haint Mist, LRV 76, the palest blue on the board: under a deep roof it still reads as color without closing the space in.
A blue that leans green. Marsh Glass (LRV 61) is the board’s greenest blue, closest to Sherwin-Williams SW 0063 Blue Sky and Benjamin Moore 639 Let It Rain: the water-like blue-green many old Lowcountry ceilings show.
Common mistakes with a blue porch ceiling
- Choosing the blue in the store’s light. Hold the chip up under your own porch roof, in the morning and the evening.
- A blue that is too deep. Under a roof a mid blue reads close to slate. Start lighter than you think.
- Forgetting the walls below. The ceiling sits over your siding and trim: try the blue on a photo of your own porch, with the house in it.
- Tapping only one part. A beam splits the ceiling into parts; on your photo, tap each one.
Choosing the rest of the front too? Try the door color with the free front door color picker, the whole house in the exterior house color visualizer, and work out the paint with the paint calculator.
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- Screened porch ideas
Haint blue questions
What is haint blue?
A pale blue or blue-green painted on porch ceilings in the American South. The Historic Savannah Foundation describes the Gullah Geechee legend behind it: evil spirits do not like water, and painting spaces to look like water keeps them away. Today the name covers a whole range of pale blues.
Why are porch ceilings painted blue?
The tradition comes from the Gullah Geechee legend that spirits, or haints, will not cross water, so a ceiling painted the color of water keeps them away. Not every Gullah family tells it: the founder of Hilton Head’s Gullah Museum says haint blue was never mentioned in hers.
What color is haint blue?
There is no single one. Haint blues run from pale sky blues to soft blue-greens. The board above holds ten, from LRV 76 down to 46; the pale ones, 55 and up, stay airy under a porch roof.
What is the Sherwin-Williams haint blue?
No color in Sherwin-Williams’ palette file is named Haint Blue; one is named Porch Ceiling (SW 9063). For every blue on this page the tool names the closest Sherwin-Williams color, such as SW 6492 Jetstream for Lowcountry Sky, along with the closest Benjamin Moore and Behr paints.
Does haint blue keep bugs away?
It is a belief: the Historic Savannah Foundation mentions it as one. We found no study to point you to, so choose the blue for how it looks.
Should a porch ceiling be lighter or darker?
Usually lighter. A porch ceiling gets no direct sun, so a blue reads deeper overhead than on the chip. Deep or shady porches suit the palest blues; a shallow, sunny porch can carry a deeper one.
Is there a haint blue visualizer?
Yes, this one: pick a blue and tap the ceiling of a sample porch or a photo of your own. It is free, needs no app or sign-up, and your photo never leaves your device.