The invention provides a color photographic element comprising at least one light-sensitive silver halide emulsion layer or a non silver-containing light-insensitive layer, in which at least one of these layers contains a colorless heterocyclic compound having either one or two hetero atoms in the ring or ring system, being other than an imidazole compound, that undergoes less than 10% chemical or redox reaction directly with oxidized developer and which has a partition coefficient to enable the photographic speed of the element to be increased by at least 0.03 stop without increasing granularity, compared to the same element without the compound. The heterocyclic compounds increase speed without a concomitant increase in size of the light-sensitive silver halide grains.