TheAlgorithms/JavaScript · error · Error

hue should be between 0 and 360

Error message

hue should be between 0 and 360

What it means

Thrown by hsvToRgb when the hue argument is below 0 or above 360. Hue is the first of three independent range guards (hue, saturation, value) checked in order, so a bad hue fails before saturation/value are inspected. Plain Error (range validation, value is the right type).

Source

Thrown at Conversions/RgbHsvConversion.js:21

 * together in various ways to reproduce a broad array of colors. The name of the model comes from
 * the initials of the three additive primary colors, red, green, and blue. Meanwhile, the HSV
 * representation models how colors appear under light. In it, colors are represented using three
 * components: hue, saturation and (brightness-)value. This file provides functions for converting
 * colors from one representation to the other. (description adapted from
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RGB_color_model and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HSL_and_HSV).
 */

/**
 * Conversion from the HSV-representation to the RGB-representation.
 *
 * @param hue Hue of the color.
 * @param saturation Saturation of the color.
 * @param value Brightness-value of the color.
 * @return The tuple of RGB-components.
 */
export function hsvToRgb(hue, saturation, value) {
  if (hue < 0 || hue > 360) {
    throw new Error('hue should be between 0 and 360')
  }

  if (saturation < 0 || saturation > 1) {
    throw new Error('saturation should be between 0 and 1')
  }

  if (value < 0 || value > 1) {
    throw new Error('value should be between 0 and 1')
  }

  const chroma = value * saturation
  const hueSection = hue / 60
  const secondLargestComponent = chroma * (1 - Math.abs((hueSection % 2) - 1))
  const matchValue = value - chroma

  return getRgbBySection(hueSection, chroma, matchValue, secondLargestComponent)
}

View on GitHub (pinned to 5c39e87a9a)

Solutions

1. Normalize hue into range before calling: ((hue % 360) + 360) % 360.
2. Validate Number.isFinite(hue) && hue >= 0 && hue <= 360 upstream.
3. If your source uses radians, convert to degrees (hue * 180 / Math.PI) and then normalize.

Example fix

// before
hsvToRgb(400, 0.5, 0.5)
// after
const norm = (h) => ((h % 360) + 360) % 360
hsvToRgb(norm(400), 0.5, 0.5)

if (!Number.isFinite(hue) || hue < 0 || hue > 360) {
  throw new Error('hue must be a finite number in [0,360]')
}
hsvToRgb(hue, saturation, value)

const isValidHue = (h) => Number.isFinite(h) && h >= 0 && h <= 360

try {
  hsvToRgb(hue, saturation, value)
} catch (e) {
  if (/hue should be between/.test(e.message)) {
    return hsvToRgb(((hue % 360) + 360) % 360, saturation, value)
  }
  throw e
}

When it happens

Trigger: Calling hsvToRgb(400, 0.5, 0.5), hsvToRgb(-10, 0.5, 0.5), or hsvToRgb(NaN, ...) (NaN comparisons are false so NaN technically slips through this guard, but any concrete out-of-range hue fails).

Common situations: Hue computed from an angle that was not normalized into [0,360]; degrees from a UI slider allowed to exceed 360; negative hues from a subtractive formula; radians fed in instead of degrees.

Related errors

• saturation should be between 0 and 1
• value should be between 0 and 1
• red should be between 0 and 255
• green should be between 0 and 255
• blue should be between 0 and 255

AI-assisted analysis of TheAlgorithms/JavaScript@5c39e87a9a (2026-08-13). Data as JSON: /api/errors/23a2a94d5228521e. Report an issue: GitHub.