Color temperature converter
Convert color temperature between kelvin and mireds, the unit that filters and white-balance shifts are actually built in.
That's about the same as midday daylight. That is cool light: daylight and the blue-white of an overcast sky.
What it means
What color is that light?
Color temperature strictly describes a glowing black body. LEDs and fluorescents get a "correlated" temperature: the nearest match, not a real one.
Every unit
Your color temperature in every unit
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Three things worth knowing
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Mireds = 1,000,000 ÷ kelvin
Mireds matter because equal steps look equal. From 2000 K to 2100 K is a visible shift; from 9000 K to 9100 K is nothing. In mireds, both are just numbers of the same size.
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Why filters are sold in mireds
A warming filter shifts a fixed number of mireds whatever light you point it at, which a kelvin figure cannot do. So filters carry mired shift values.
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Warm light is the cooler one
A "warm white" bulb is 2700 K and a "cool white" is 6500 K. The names come from how the colors feel, not from the temperature.
Shortcuts
Popular color temperature conversions
Background
About color temperature
Heat metal and it glows red, then orange, then white, then blue. Color temperature names a light by the temperature a black body would need to glow that color, so 2700 K is the warm orange of a filament bulb and 6500 K the blue-white of an overcast sky.
Confusingly, high temperatures are called "cool" colors and low ones "warm", which is backwards from the physics.