Can dogs see color?
Yes, dogs can see some colors, but not as many as people. They see mainly in shades of blue and yellow and have trouble telling red from green.
Human eyes have three types of color-detecting cone cells, sensitive to red, green and blue light. Dogs have only two types, sensitive to blue and yellow. This is called dichromatic vision, similar to red-green color blindness in people. A red ball on green grass may look grayish-brown to a dog and be harder to spot than a blue one.
Dogs make up for this in other ways. Their eyes have more rod cells, which work in dim light, and a reflective layer called the tapetum lucidum, which helps them see better at dawn, dusk and night. Dogs are also very good at detecting movement.
Not black and white
The old idea that dogs see only in black and white is a myth. Studies in the 1980s and 1990s showed that dogs could pick out colored panels to earn rewards. Their eyesight is less sharp than ours, though, so distant objects look blurrier to them.
Did You Know?
The glow you see in a dog's eyes in photos taken with a flash comes from the tapetum lucidum reflecting light back through the eye.