<p>Reef-building corals are increasingly threatened by the warming climate, necessitating the development of tools to monitor their responses to environmental stress and identify resilient individuals. Techniques commonly used to quantify thermal sensitivity, or the severity of coral bleaching, can be invasive or require specialized instruments. Yet, more widely accessible visual methods can be limited by subjectivity. This study evaluates a noninvasive, objective, color-based approach for evaluating the status of coral symbiosis and compares thermal tolerance results with traditional bleaching metrics. Using the staghorn coral <i>Acropora cervicornis</i> as a model, acute thermal tolerance was assessed across genets, sites, and seasons within an active coral restoration program in Bonaire, Caribbean Netherlands. Quantitative color scores were significantly correlated with traditional bleaching metrics and identified similar genetic and environmental effects on coral thermal tolerance. Most importantly, color-based metrics demonstrated a high level of agreement with both symbiont and chlorophyll retention in detecting significant pairwise differences in acute thermal resistance. The findings of this study provide support for color analysis as a complementary and reliable method for assessing coral resilience. This cost-effective approach can be implemented by non-experts within coral conservation and may be of particular benefit in resource-limited regions.</p>