Cyan

//ˈsaɪˌæn// adj, noun

adj, noun ·Uncommon ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    An additive secondary colour midway between green and blue, evoked by wavelengths between ~490 and ~520 nm. countable, uncountable

    "CMYK stands for cyan, magenta, yellow, and black. This four component color system is standard for most types of color printing, since black is an ink color in printing but is simply the absence of color in video."

  2. 2
    a primary subtractive color for light; has a blue-green color wordnet
Adjective
  1. 1
    Of the colour cyan.
Adjective
  1. 1
    of the blue-green color that is a primary subtractive color of light wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms
aquablueblueblue greencolorpigment

Example

More examples

"Oliver is going to fly a cyan kite in the blue sky."

Etymology

Learned borrowing from Ancient Greek κύανος (kúanos), a shade of blue variously described as similar to cornflower, copper carbonate, and lapis lazuli, Mycenaean Greek 𐀓𐀷𐀜 (ku-wa-no), possibly from Hittite [script needed] (kuwannan-, “a precious stone; copper; shade of blue”). Compare modern Greek κυανός (kyanós), also used for cyan.

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.