What is the Rarest Eye Color in Humans and Animals?

Eye colors vary in each person and especially in each living creature. There are hazel, brown, black, green, blue, violet, and even red eye colors. Out of all the many splendid colors that each creature can have, brown eyes and hazel eyes are the most common and green and violet eyes are the rarest.

What gives the eye its distinctive color? Before you learn about the rarest eye color in humans and in animals, it will be good for you to know how and why the eyes have different colors. The iris, the part of the eye surrounding the cornea (the center of the eye), is the part where eye colors are seen. It is a muscle which acts like a diaphragm around the pupil and controls the intensity or the amount of light that enters the eye. Melanin can be found in this part of the eye. There are mainly two pigments of melanin found here: black and yellow. Different combinations of these pigments results to different colors and varying intensities. Research and studies prove that when you no melanin at all in your iris, your eye color is blue. Blue eyes are most common among those in the west especially in Germany, Netherlands, Iceland, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Austria. Some people in Central Asia and in Middle East may have blue eyes when they were first born but these changes into another color because as babies grow older in these areas, they tend to produce more melanin. In these parts of the world, brown and hazel eyes are more dominant. Increase in the amount of yellow pigments with a combination of different levels of black pigments in the eye results to colors like brown, hazel, violet, green, and even gray eyes. Among all of these eye colors, green and violet are the rarest.

Green eyes are a result of a genetic mutation that occurs very rare. It is most common in Europe and is also found in some parts of West Asia. Green eyes are the product of moderate amounts of melanin in the iris. However, green comes only second to violet as being the rarest eye color. It is because there were only two people who have violet eyes. One of them is said to be Elizabeth Taylor. This is a misconception for Taylor’s eyes are not really violet which only further proves the rarity of the certain eye color. Taylor’s eyes are very deep blue that they would appear violet especially when triggered and put under certain lights.

Eye colors may appear to have been different under different lighting conditions. For example, a very sky blue eye color would appear a cold gray when put under a certain light level. Moreover, today’s makeup are able to make the eye color somehow shine or glow or even change or make it darker or lighter. The color of clothes may also change the appearance of eye colors.

There are even cases when the eyes are red. This usually happens in albinos when the blood veins in their eyes are so visible that when they are filled with blood, their eyes would seem red. However, there is still no agreement as to what eye color is the rarest. But, it is long speculated that the very rare occurrence of violet and green eyes make them the rarest eye colors.