All peppers -- that is chilli peppers and sweet peppers -- have an unripe colour that changes as the pepper ripens up to another colour. There are several unripe colours, the most common are green (dark to very pale green), yellow and purple, and ripe colours include red, yellow, orange and brown. The most common colour change, of course, is from unripe green to a ripe red. However, there are several other colour combinations.
Why is it important to know whether a pepper is ripe? Firstly, the flavour of a pepper is quite different between ripe and unripe (think of the difference between a ripe and unripe tomato) - the ripe being sweeter. Secondly, for chillies the fruit will be at their hottest when they are fully ripe.
At what stage shoul you eat a pepper? There are no rules, a pepper can be eaten at any stage of maturity and ripeness, it is entirely up to you.

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