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Colour Swap for Pixel Art: Recolour a Sprite

Pick a colour from your sprite's palette or click it on the image, choose what to replace it with, and stack as many swaps as you need. Or shift the hue and lightness of the whole sprite in one move. Live, exact pixels, PNG out.

1 · YOUR SPRITE

DROP, PASTE OR BROWSE
PNG, GIF or WebP · up to 4 megapixels

2 · SWAP A COLOUR

Nothing selected. Click a swatch above, or pick from the image.
Rules 0
No swaps yet. Rules run top to bottom on the sprite.

3 · WHOLE-SPRITE RECOLOUR

Very dark pixels sit out the hue and lightness shift, so a black outline stays black.
Want a real themed variant with new detail, not just moved colours? Reskin in SpriteLab redraws the sprite as lava, ice, gold, anything, while keeping its shape.
Result appears here
NOTHING HERE YETDrop a sprite on the left. Its palette appears under the dropzone; pick a colour, choose a replacement, apply.

How it works

Drop in a sprite

Its palette is read straight away and listed under the dropzone, most used colour first. Transparent pixels are ignored.

Pick, replace, apply

Click a swatch, or hit Pick from image and click the pixel you mean. Choose the replacement colour and apply. Each swap becomes a rule you can remove later; rules run top to bottom.

Or shift everything

The hue and lightness sliders recolour the whole sprite in one move, with the outline held in place. Hold the compare button to see the original, then download the PNG or the new palette as a .hex file.

Swap rules vs hue shift

Both recolour a sprite, but they are for different jobs. A rule is surgical: one exact colour becomes another and nothing else moves. The sliders are broad: every colour rotates or lightens together, which keeps the shading relationships intact.

Use a swap rule when

You want the cape blue but the skin unchanged. A team colour on a unit. Fixing one wrong shade in a ramp. Anything where the rest of the sprite must stay exactly as drawn.

Use the sliders when

You want a quick variant of the whole thing: a green slime from a blue one, a night version, a paler ghost. Turn on Preserve outline so the ink stays dark.

Neither adds detail. A red knight shifted to orange is still the same knight. For a lava knight with cracks and glow, or a frost version with icicles, the Reskin mode in SpriteLab redraws the sprite in a theme while keeping its silhouette pixel for pixel.

FAQ

Is the colour swap tool free?

Yes. It runs in your browser with no account, no watermark and no upload. Your sprite never leaves your machine.

Why did a swap only change some of the pixels?

A rule replaces one exact colour. Pixel art usually has a handful of flat colours so that is what you want, but a sprite with anti-aliasing or a JPEG has many near-identical shades. Run it through the colour reducer first to flatten those, then swap.

What is the difference between a swap rule and the hue slider?

A rule changes one colour and leaves everything else alone, which is how you turn a red cape blue without touching the skin. The hue and lightness sliders move every colour at once, which is a quick way to make a whole variant like a green slime from a blue one.

What does Preserve outline do?

It keeps very dark pixels out of the hue and lightness shift, so a black or near-black outline stays black instead of turning dark blue or dark red. Swap rules still apply to those pixels if you target them.

Can this make a themed variant, like a lava or ice version?

Sliders and swaps only move the colours that are already there. For a real themed variant with new detail, cracks and glow on a lava knight, frost on an ice one, use the Reskin mode in SpriteLab, which redraws the sprite in a theme while keeping its shape.

More free tools

In the app

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