The authors introduce the concept of finitely coloured equivalence for unital $^*$-homomorphisms between $mathrm C^*$-algebras, for which unitary equivalence is the $1$-coloured case. They use this notion to classify $^*$-homomorphisms from separable, unital, nuclear $mathrm C^*$-algebras into ultrapowers of simple, unital, nuclear, $mathcal Z$-stable $mathrm C^*$-algebras with compact extremal trace space up to $2$-coloured equivalence by their behaviour on traces; this is based on a $1$-coloured classification theorem for certain order zero maps, also in terms of tracial data.

As an application the authors calculate the nuclear dimension of non-AF, simple, separable, unital, nuclear, $mathcal Z$-stable $mathrm C^*$-algebras with compact extremal trace space: it is 1. In the case that the extremal trace space also has finite topological covering dimension, this confirms the remaining open implication of the Toms-Winter conjecture. Inspired by homotopy-rigidity theorems in geometry and topology, the authors derive a ``homotopy equivalence implies isomorphism'' result for large classes of $mathrm C^*$-algebras with finite nuclear dimension.