Color Code for Fiber Optic Cables

Fiber optic cables are terminated using an industry standard color code.

For cables that consist of more than 12 strands, the color code repeats itself. Each group of 12 strands is identified with some other means such as:

• multiple buffer tubes each with 12 or less strands either numbered or colored following the same color code, e.g., 1st tube is blue, 2nd is orange, etc.
• 24 strand groups with the color code repeating with some variation, e.g., the 1st group of 12 strands are solid colors and the 2nd group are solid colors with a stripe or some other identifying mark.

The color sequence is illustrated below. It is very similar to the color code for twisted pair cables except the second group of colors is used first and 2 new colors are added at the end.

Jacket Colors

For outdoor aerial and burial type cables, the jacket color is usually black polyethelene for both multimode and singlemode cables.

For indoor cables, the outer most cable jacket may be any color but the de facto industry standard is:

• Orange for multimode fibers
• Yellow for singlemode fibers

This is also generally true for fiber optic patch cords.