Color · Menswear
Shirt and tie color combinations.
Pick your suit, shirt and occasion. Get tie colours ranked on a live suit, shirt and tie swatch, with the value contrast between shirt and tie and a warning when the two sit too close. Shoe and belt matching included. Runs in your browser; nothing is sent or stored.
Short answer for a navy suit: burgundy and red are the classic ties, with navy, forest green, silver or light blue as quieter options. Skip black. On a white shirt almost anything dark enough works; on a light blue shirt, avoid ties in the same pale blue because shirt and tie blur together. These are menswear conventions, not rules.
Your outfit
Ranked tie colors
Shoes and belt
Wear the belt in the same colour and finish as the shoes. Swatches are representative colours; real fabric and lighting will shift them. Guidance only.
How the ranking works
1. Base score. Each suit colour has a fixed 0 to 3 score for each of 14 tie colours (3 classic, 2 good, 1 acceptable, 0 avoided by convention). The table is menswear convention written for this tool: it is widely repeated advice, not a standard, and tastes differ.
2. Value contrast. Value means lightness. We compute the WCAG 2.x relative luminance of the shirt and tie swatches, L = 0.2126·R + 0.7152·G + 0.0722·B with each sRGB channel linearised (c/12.92 at or below 0.04045, else ((c+0.055)/1.055)2.4), then ratio = (L1 + 0.05) / (L2 + 0.05) with L1 the lighter. This is used only as a lightness-difference metric, not an accessibility claim. Our own thresholds: below 1.5:1 the tie is flagged too close to the shirt and loses 3 points; 1.5 to 3:1 loses 1; 3:1 or more gains 1.
3. Adjustments. A tie in the same colour family as the shirt (blue on blue, pink on pink, lavender on lavender) loses 1; red on a pink shirt loses 1. With a bold shirt pattern, saturated ties (red, pink, gold, purple, rust, teal) lose 1. Occasion shifts: Interview adds to navy, burgundy, charcoal and silver and subtracts from the bold colours and red; Wedding (as a guest) adds to silver, pink, light blue, gold and burgundy and subtracts from black, charcoal and brown; Business adds 1 to red. Scores are clamped to 0 to 5, and a pairing the base table avoids is held at 0.
4. Shoes. Fixed list per suit colour; interviews show only the safest first choice.
Sources. W3C, WCAG 2.2 relative luminance and contrast ratio. The pairing table has no primary source; it is editorial convention.
Limits. Swatches are single representative colours per name. Textures, sheen, tie patterns, skin tone, dress codes and personal style are not modelled. Black-tie and white-tie dress are out of scope.
FAQ
What color tie goes with a navy suit?
Burgundy and red are the classics, followed by navy, forest green, silver, light blue, pink and gold. Black and rust are the ones this tool downgrades. On a light blue shirt, pale blue and silver ties get flagged for sitting too close to the shirt.
What color tie goes with a grey or charcoal suit?
Grey is the most flexible: navy, burgundy, pink and purple all rank high. Charcoal favours burgundy, red and silver. Brown and rust ties are avoided on charcoal by convention.
Should the tie be darker than the shirt?
Usually, yes. A tie noticeably darker than the shirt reads cleanly. When the two are within about 1.5:1 in value, the tie fades into the shirt, which is what the warning flags. Light-on-dark combinations can work but need a clear value gap too.
Can I wear a patterned tie with a patterned shirt?
Yes, if the scales differ clearly: a wide stripe tie over a fine check shirt, for example. If both are bold, one of them should become a solid. The pattern setting here lowers saturated ties for bold shirts and gives scale advice.
Does the belt have to match the shoes?
Convention says yes: same colour and a similar finish. Black shoes take a black belt; brown shoes take a brown belt close in shade.
Is this advice a rule?
No. It is conventional guidance encoded as a table, so it will not suit every dress code, culture or taste. Treat the ranking as a starting point and trust your eye.