Looking at an update to the bug noted by Bilal in the comments, it looks like this is a known issue which might be fixed in 2.3:.
Hi all coders, I want to change the order in which color swatches appears on listing page for a configurable product. I want that the first color.
You have to edit configurable product, in configurable tab (product edit page) you can view option for Edit Configurations. Click on Edit Configurations, you can ...
Product Find swatch attribute and edit it and goto Manage Swatch.
In the Is Default column, select the swatch that is to be the default option. To change the order of the swatches, simply drag each swatch into ...
Mark the checkbox under the Is Default to set the default color as you need. Enable to change the order when click on the icon in the top left of Manage Swatch ...
In configurable product associated product's gallery images not sorting as set in Admin Preconditions (*) Magento CE 2.2.7 PHP 7.0.6 Steps to ...
The Custom Layout Update field on the CMS Page Edit, Category Edit, and Product Edit
In our case loading the view configuration happened in the following order: Acme /default (swatch_image: 250x250, swatch_thumb: 500x500) ...
Enable to change the order when tap on the icon in the Manage Swatch table and move it to the new position. After the completion of the above ...