Color, Gradient and Gamma Test

Four checks you judge with your own eyes: smooth gradients for banding, near-black and near-white steps for crushed shadows and clipped highlights, a gamma pattern, and full-screen colour blocks for dead pixels and tints.

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About this tool

Set browser zoom to 100%, turn off night light or colour filters, and use the monitor’s standard or sRGB preset. A dim room makes shadow details much easier to judge.

How to read the results

Gradients and banding

The bars run from black to full brightness. Smooth is good. Visible vertical bands, or colour tints in the gray bar, suggest a limited panel or colour settings that need attention.

Black and white steps

Patches 0 to 15 and 240 to 255 show whether the very dark and very bright ends keep detail. If the first few dark patches merge, shadows are crushed. If the last light patches merge, highlights are clipping. Adjust brightness and contrast slightly and look again.

Gamma

The canvas draws a fine pattern at exact device pixels beside solid gray swatches. Where the pattern and the swatch look the same brightness is your effective gamma. 2.2 is the usual target. The result is reliable only at 100% zoom, as scaling blurs the pattern.

Colour blocks

Full-screen red, green, blue, cyan, magenta, yellow, white, black and gray reveal dead or stuck pixels, uneven backlight and tinted whites. Tap or click to move to the next colour and press Esc to leave.

Frequently asked questions

What is banding?

Visible steps in a gradient that should look smooth. Some is normal on 8-bit panels; heavy banding can come from the panel, the cable or colour settings.

Why can I not see patch 1 on the dark chart?

Your brightness or contrast may be too low, the room may be bright, or the display may crush shadows. Raise brightness a little and view in a dimmer room.

Is this a calibration?

No. A calibration needs a colorimeter. These patterns help you spot obvious problems and fix basic settings.

Why does the gamma test look off on my laptop?

Display scaling that is not a whole number makes the fine pattern blur. Use 100% zoom and, if you can, 100% or 200% display scaling.

Does this replace a colorimeter?

No. These are visual checks. A colorimeter or spectrophotometer is needed for accurate colour calibration.

Why are my gradients banded?

Eight-bit panels show a little stepping; strong bands can come from a low colour depth setting, a limited video output or aggressive display processing.