The Rarest Eye Color In The World

Eyes are powerful, and not just because of that creepy Illuminati eye symbol. Often dubbed the "windows to the soul," staring into a person's open eyes is one of the most intimate forms of connection there is, whether you're gazing at your lover, exchanging a playful glance with your dog, or staring down your archenemy over an exploding volcano. Considering this, it's no wonder that humans are so fascinated by the many different hues that irises come in.

As you probably know, eye color is determined by the amount of melanin found in the iris. The more melanin, the darker. While everyone is familiar with brown eyes, green eyes, and blue eyes, though, there are some rarer colors out there, which might make you do a double take. 

Violet and/or red eyes are the rarest

It's often said that the rarest eye colors in the world are purple and/or red, and in a certain regard, this is true. To be clear, though, there's nobody running around with vibrant scarlet irises like the X-Men's Gambit, and when it comes to classifying violet/red/pink eyes as a normal eye color, there's a catch: namely, that such hues are the result of albinism, according to Owlcation, and it isn't a true "eye color" in the same sense as, say, hazel eyes. Albinism, of course, is the condition wherein a person is born with very low levels of pigment in their skin and hair. Most people with this condition do not have red or purple eyes, but some do, and as explained by Brenner Children's Hospital, this effect is actually caused by the sheer lack of color in their irises, which then causes the blood vessels on the retina to show through.

What about Elizabeth Taylor, you ask? Well, it's tricky, according to Live Science. Elizabeth Taylor's eyes certainly had a very unique pigment, but technically, it was blue: however, she knew how to bring out the inner purple within that blue, through the use of makeup, photography, and so on. So, whether you think of violet as a real eye "color," or not, depends on how you define it. 

Other unusual eye colors

If you take purple and red out of the equation, though, what other eye colors are exceedingly rare?

Amber and hazel eyes, for the record, are far rarer than they seem: such colors only appear on about 5% of the global population. Even more unusual are gray eyes, which only 1 percent of the population can brag about, and which certainly look quite mystical if you're lucky enough to have them. True gray eyes, according to the World Atlas, are most frequently seen in the populations of Eastern Europe and Northern Europe, and are caused by a low level of melanin in the front layer of the iris. Another potential candidate is heterochromia, wherein a person's eyes are two wildly different colors.

So hey, if your eyes are gray, two different colors, or amber, consider yourself a highly unique individual.