Abstract: Five tea plant accessions exhibiting varying purpling levels were selected to investigate the color parameters and metabolomic characteristics of fresh purple leaf tea leaves and their baked green tea infusions, using CIELAB colorimetry, ultra-high performance liquid chromatography-quadrupole-electrostatic field orbital trap mass spectrometry (UHPLC-Q-Exactive-MS), and photodiode array detector (PDA) detection, in order to elucidate the chemical basis of color differences in purple leaf tea. Results showed that, as purpling deepened, the L^* (lightness) and b^* (yellowness) values of both fresh tea leaves and baked green tea infusions significantly decreased, while a^* (redness) values generally increased. These changes were all highly correlated with anthocyanin content. Metabolomics identified a total of 122 compounds, and partial least squares-discriminant analysis (PLS-DA) effectively distinguished the tea samples. Analysis revealed that the color differences in purple leaf tea were not only determined by the total anthocyanin content, but were also closely related to the relative proportions of their core anthocyanin components. Specifically, the orange-red color of red purple (RP) infusions primarily originated from their abundance in cyanidin derivatives and higher content of theaflavins; whereas the deep-purple hue of deep purple (DP) infusions was dominated by the highly abundant delphinidin derivatives. PDA spectral analysis confirmed that cyanidin-3-O-β-d-(6-(E)-p-coumaroyl) galactopyranoside and delphinidin-3-O-β-d-(6-(E)-p-coumaroyl) galactopyranoside were the major color contributors for RP and DP accessions, respectively. Furthermore, flavonol glycoside was key component forming the yellow base of green leaf (GL) infusions, and these, along with anthocyanins and tea pigments, synergistically constructed the color characteristics of the tea infusion through copigmentation effects. This study elucidated the intrinsic chemical compounds determining the color gradient and hue differentiation of purple leaf tea, which could provide a scientific basis for the quality evaluation of purple leaf tea.