The color cyan, a greenish-blue, has notable tints and shades.It is one of the subtractive primary colors- cyan, magenta, and yellow.. The first written use of Teal as a color name in English was in 1917. Teal is a deep blue - green color; a dark cyan . Teal is a blue-green color that is a shade of cyan. The similarity of colors can be determined by the name or using special formula to calculate distance between different named colors. Douglas was originally a place name (for example, a tributary of the River Clyde), which then became a Scottish clan name borne by a powerful line of earls. Anglicized form of the Scottish surname Dubhghlas, meaning "dark river" from Gaelic dubh "dark" and glais "water, river" (an archaic word related to glas "grey, green"). As such, it is extremely familiar to visual designers. Its name comes from the common teal, a duck native to Eurasia that has a characteristic dark cyan stripe on its head. Teal is one of the original 16 web colors introduced into html in 1999. It can be created by mixing green with blue into a white base, or deepened as needed with a little bit of black or gray color. Here are the different color shades of Teal. Teal is a low-saturation color, a bluish-green to dark medium, similar to medium blue-green and dark cyan. Teal synonyms. Teal gets its name from the colored area around the eyes of the common teal, a member of the duck family. Top synonyms for teal (other words for teal) are aqua, azure and blue-green. The sets below has both types (similar by name and closer in distance) The first recorded use of cyan blue ("cyan blue" was the name used for the color "cyan" in the 19th century) as a color name was in 1879.