Cats can be trained to distinguish between some colors, such as blue and green. Part of the reason cats see better at night than humans is that they have more rods and fewer cones in their eyes than we do. However, since cones are the structures that enable mammals to see color, cats do not see color as well as we do. Look at the two pictures below to see the difference between how a cat might see color and how most humans see color. While no one can know exactly how a cat sees color, one thing all researchers agree on is that cats definitely do not see color the same way we do.
Reds appear dark, and greens appear somewhat lighter and duller.
Produced by the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County . This page was made possible by a grant from Friskies PetCare Company and the National Science Foundation.