scribu

<p>Custom fields are great for storing various meta data about a post. However, if you routinely need to display posts that have a certain custom field value, you should consider switching to a <a href="https://codex.wordpress.org/Custom_Taxonomies" rel="nofollow ugc">custom taxonomy</a>, which is better suited for grouping posts.</p>
<p>With this simple plugin, you can convert all custom fields with a certain key to terms in a certain taxonomy, while maintaining the post association.</p>
<p><strong>Note:</strong> If you’re looking for the old version, see <a href="https://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/custom-query-fields/" rel="ugc">Custom Query Fields</a></p>
<p>Links: <a href="http://scribu.net/wordpress/custom-field-taxonomies" rel="nofollow ugc">Plugin News</a> | <a href="http://scribu.net" rel="nofollow ugc">Author’s Site</a></p>


Custom Field Taxonomies

Convert custom fields to tags, categories or taxonomy terms

John James Jacoby

Stuttter

<p>Pretty colors for categories, tags, and other taxonomy terms</p>
<p>WP Term Colors allows users to assign colors to any visible category, tag, or taxonomy term using a fancy color picker, providing a customized look for their taxonomies.</p>
<h4>Dependencies</h4>
<p>This plugin requires <a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-term-meta/" title="Metadata, for taxonomy terms." rel="ugc">WP Term Meta</a></p>
<h4>Also checkout</h4>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-chosen/" title="Make long, unwieldy select boxes much more user-friendly." rel="ugc">WP Chosen</a></li>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-pretty-filters/" title="Makes post filters better match what's already in Media & Attachments." rel="ugc">WP Pretty Filters</a></li>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-event-calendar/" title="The best way to manage events in WordPress." rel="ugc">WP Event Calendar</a></li>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-media-categories/" title="Add categories to media & attachments." rel="ugc">WP Media Categories</a></li>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-term-order/" title="Sort taxonomy terms, your way." rel="ugc">WP Term Order</a></li>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-term-authors/" title="Authors for categories, tags, and other taxonomy terms." rel="ugc">WP Term Authors</a></li>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-term-colors/" title="Pretty colors for categories, tags, and other taxonomy terms." rel="ugc">WP Term Colors</a></li>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-term-icons/" title="Pretty icons for categories, tags, and other taxonomy terms." rel="ugc">WP Term Icons</a></li>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-term-visibility/" title="Visibilities for categories, tags, and other taxonomy terms." rel="ugc">WP Term Visibility</a></li>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-user-activity/" title="The best way to log activity in WordPress." rel="ugc">WP User Activity</a></li>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-user-avatars/" title="Allow users to upload avatars or choose them from your media library." rel="ugc">WP User Avatars</a></li>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-user-groups/" title="Group users together with taxonomies & terms." rel="ugc">WP User Groups</a></li>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-user-profiles/" title="A sophisticated way to edit users in WordPress." rel="ugc">WP User Profiles</a></li>
</ul>


WP Term Colors

I needed to save colors for terms, and found that @jjj had already done the work. Accessing the saved colors is pretty straightforward using the new (WP 4.4 or newer) built-in utility function:
$color = get_term_meta( $term_id, 'color', true );
The terms are saved in hex format (#eeee22) so are ready to use once retrieved.
Thanks @jjj.



Works well with WP's new termmeta table

Pretty colors for categories, tags, and other taxonomy terms

Custom Field Taxonomies vs WP Term Colors