How Rare Are Green Eyes?

Eye color is one of the first things someone will notice about your appearance. In general, eye colors can range from very light blue to dark brown, and no one person has the exact same shade of eye color, according to Cleveland Clinic. The colored part of your eye is called the iris and the color is primarily created by varying levels of melanin, explains VeryWell Health. For example, very dark eyes will have more melanin. Your genetics play a key role in determining your eye color because they control the amount of melanin, per MedlinePlus. However, some colors are rarer than others.

By far, the most common eye color is brown. Between 55% and 79% of the world's population has brown-colored eyes (via Healthline). Scientists have determined roughly 10,000 years ago everyone on Earth had brown eyes. However, at a point in time, someone was born with a gene mutation that resulted in less melanin in the eye, allowing for varying eye colors to come into existence, according to the American Academy of Ophthalmology. So what is the rarest eye color?

People with blue eyes make up 8% to 10% of the population while those with green eyes make up only 2%, according to Healthline. But why are they so rare? Because the irises of people with green eyes have very little melanin and a lot of a pigment called lipochrome. That low level of melanin is what's considered rare and requires the perfect blend from your parent's eye colors as well as genetic luck from your ancestors, explained All About Vision.

Among the normal eye colors, green is the rarest. However, there are certain colors and eye conditions that are even rarer. For example, people with heterochromia, also known as Horner syndrome, are born with, or develop later in life, two different colored eyes. Less than 200,000 people in the United States have this condition, according to the Canadian Medical Association Journal.