Guide · Colour analysis
How to find your skin undertone
Your undertone is the colour beneath the surface of your skin, and it doesn't change when you tan: it can be warm (golden or peachy), cool (pink or blue), neutral (a mix) or olive (greenish). To find it, look at the veins on your wrist in daylight, compare how gold and silver look on you and notice how your skin reacts to the sun. If two or three tests agree, that's your undertone.
Take the colour test (One photo, free and no account: undertone, season and palette)
Skin tone and undertone aren't the same
Skin tone is how light or dark your skin is, and it changes in summer. Undertone is the shade underneath, and it stays the same all your life. Two people with the same fair skin can have opposite undertones, which is why black suits one and camel suits the other.
Four tests to find it
- Wrist veins, in natural light: if they look greenish, you lean warm; blue or purple, you lean cool; if you can't tell, you're probably neutral.
- Gold or silver: hold one of each near your face. If gold lights you up, warm; if silver looks better, cool; if both work, neutral.
- Optical white or off-white: in a pure white T-shirt, cool skin looks clearer; off-white or ivory flatters warm skin.
- The sun: if you tan easily and your skin turns golden, it's usually warm; if you burn before you tan, it's usually cool.
What if my skin is olive?
An olive undertone has a greenish or greyish cast. It's often mistaken for warm because it tans well, but very orange colours make it look dull. Deep earthy tones, olive green, burgundy and navy usually suit it.
Which colours suit your undertone
- Warm: camel, mustard, coral, olive green, chocolate brown, off-white. Metal: gold.
- Cool: navy, grey, fuchsia, raspberry, emerald, pure white. Metal: silver.
- Neutral: most medium-intensity colours, like blush pink, sage green or petrol blue.
- Olive: deep earth tones, burgundy, bottle green, navy, aubergine.
Undertone is only one part
Colour analysis uses your undertone together with two other things: how light or deep your colouring is (skin, hair and eyes together) and how bright or soft it is. The combination gives your colour season, which is much more precise than undertone alone: two warm people can be a Light Spring and a Deep Autumn, with very different palettes.
FAQ
Can my undertone change? No. Your skin tone changes with the sun or with age, but your undertone stays the same. What can change over the years is contrast, because hair gets lighter or greyer.
What if every test says something different? That's common with neutral and olive undertones. Look at which tests gave the clearest result, or take a photo-based colour test, which looks at skin, hair and eyes together.
Does it help choose foundation? Yes: brands usually label foundations W (warm), C (cool), N (neutral) and sometimes O (olive). Pick the one that matches your undertone and, within it, the shade closest to your skin.
Guides
- What is colour analysis? The 12 seasons explained
- How to find your skin undertone
- How to build a capsule wardrobe from scratch