However, some circles encompassed the entire space or significant portions of the orange and lighter pink areas. When asked to circle the area for ruby color, most respondents stuck to the middle and upper-right halves of the color gradient - from a pure red to strongly purplish red. Ruby Color: Pigeon's Blood to Red Raspberry What some chose as a top color for pink sapphire, others saw as a top color for padparadscha or even ruby. Top colors chosen for pink sapphires tended toward purple, and the colors for padparadscha tended toward orange. This made it easier to select a pure red hue. In part, this is because the color palette provided started and ended in red, rather than being centered on red. Some laboratories may call a borderline stone a ruby, while others may call it a pink sapphire.įor top ruby color, respondents chose colors very close to true red in hue.

While gemological laboratories have standards distinguishing ruby from pink sapphire, these aren't universal. More recently, Western gemologists have distinguished red and pink. Long ago, pink corundum was also considered to be ruby, since pink is a lighter tone of red. Ruby is red corundum, while sapphire is any other color. Though most would call the center stone in this ring a ruby, some may argue that it's too pink to be 'ruby.' © CustomMade. Read on to learn more about the survey results and the distinction between these gems. Our 281 respondents had varying and often overlapping opinions about color in our ruby and sapphire survey.

So, in September 2018, we sent out a survey asking for people's opinions on these gems. We wanted to learn more about the fuzzy line between ruby, pink sapphire, and padparadscha sapphire. Color is the only thing that separates them. These gems are the same mineral: corundum. The distinction between ruby and sapphire is more nebulous than most people realize.

Orange pink sapphire