Colour Depth

This is the number of bits per pixel on a monitor to represent a colour. The more bits per pixel a monitor has the more variety of colour it can show. This will affect even the quality of the monitor, because the more colours it can show the higher the quality it would be.

Thanks to the evolution of the technology, the colour depth improved a lot. It went from 1-bit to 48-bit.

Bit Colour Difference

Different colour depths:

1-bit shows 2 colours, Monochrome display.

2-bit shows 4 colours, CGA display.

4-bit shows 16 colours, EGA display.

8-bit shows 256 colours, VGA display.

16-bit shows 65,536 colours, XGA display.

32-bit shows 4,294,967,296 colours

48-bit shows 281,474,976,710,656 colours

Reference:

http://www.computerhope.com/jargon/c/colordep.htm