The color orange occurs about halfway between red and yellow on the visible spectrum, at wavelengths between 585 and 620 nm.

It seems that most human languages did not have a word for the color orange before encountering the orange fruit, as the word for the fruit and the color are identical in most languages.

The English word "orange" comes from Old French orenge which in turn comes from Arabic naranj, which ultimately derives from the Sanskrit naranga ("orange"). Although the "n" survives in Spanish naranja, it was dropped almost immediately from other Latinate languages, perhaps via analogy with Latin aurum ("gold").

Although the word "orange" entered the English language in reference to the fruit prior to 1400, the earliest recorded instance of the word used in reference to the color does not occur until a 1512 will, and did not gain widespread usage until the 1540s. Prior to this time, the color, if distinguished from red or yellow at all, was known only as "yellow-red," a term which was in use as early as Old English geoluread ("yellow-red").