Sometimes deciding a good hair color for dark skin toned women or men can be a daunting task. The best hair color should be one that makes you stand out while uplifting your true character be it at summer, winter, fall or spring
The best hair colors for dark skin range from blonde, red, burgundy, purple, brown, silver and other light shades. These colors match seamlessly well with the dark skin tone. Black women who have been spotted in these hues not only stand out but also look stunningly beautiful.
Whether you have tan, brown, deep or light-medium- deep dark skin tone, an African American or simply a black, this guide is for you. Find out color charts, good color ideas with photos plus more tips for your new hairstyles and cuts.
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Blonde Hair on Dark Skin
There are quite a number of blonde shades for dark skins with both short and long hair. Basing on numbers, it is the most sought hair color by dark-skinned netizens from all around the world. You may choose to go for the iconic platinum, the classic honey blonde or simply throw in a modern shade like nordic white.
Depending on how much you are will to spend on achieving and keeping you hair, there’s at least one shade that will make you hair breathe new life. Following are some ideas for your inspiration.
Platinum Blonde
The adoration of platinum keeps to grow and grow. Platinum provides you a chance to not only lighten your hair but also your skin tone. This shade of blonde is so cutting-edge but still so chic as shown below
If you want super white go for a pure-white platinum over an ashy-toned platinum, which can look too grey. Platinum, like silver is not is to achieve. Let a professional handle it for you.
Honey Blonde
This the perfect blonde shade for you if, all you want is a classic look. The honey hue will definitely warm up your complexion adding to it a sense of true beauty.
Ash Blonde
Ashy is not a new kid in the street, it is as popular as honey and platinum. It has gray tint create an ash hue.
RedHair Color for Dark Skin
You don’t have to be a native redhead to rock a red hue. Thedark skin has a particular liking to red hair, especially if the red is of adeeper shade.
Red is perfect. It will give you the absolute contrast since red hair color shades can really add some glow into your skin tone.
One thing you should know is thatred is a color and not just a level. Therefore, to determine the best red haircolor for dark skin tone, you need to understand the right level of red to gowith.
You should ask how dark, how warm,cool or light you want it and if it will be suitable for a black skin. So, whatred hair colors should you go for if you have a dark skin tone? Here are tipsfor you:
Dark Red Hair Dark Skin
Instead of choosing a bright shade of red you can try dark. Following are some ideas in photo
Red hair highlights:
These are definitely the low maintenance choice if you want to have red hair. Without working too hard to color all your hair, highlights will add some kick to your locks as well and will still look great.
When youdecide to do highlights using red hair colors, ensure that you use abrown-based shade. This will always add some richness to your hair and give youa more natural look.
Remember that this way, you will beworking with your natural hair’s underlying pigments of brown and will help itlast even longer than when you are just applying a red hair dye to darkhair.
Lightening is important: if you are planning to do a full hair coloring so that youend up as a dark skin redhead, you should start with hair lightening in orderto get the right hue you are looking for.
REMEMBER: While red hair can be worn on medium skin tones to darkskin tones, black women should be careful with it.
Naturally, a dark skin tone as youalready know looks gorgeous with chestnut brown to medium auburn shades.
Those rich red hues on a dark skin, however can have too much blue in them and this might make you look green.
Following more ideas on red hair for your inspiration
Brown Hair on Dark Skin
Brown is similar to black, ubiquitous with dark skins. It’sone of the best dyes to use with this skin tone because it’s bold and subtle atthe same time. It also has a natural appearance, and it’s also very low inmaintenance.
There is a wide range of this hue, and you can start from light to golden reds, but which one will look cute for a dark skin tone?
Light and Ash Brown
Generally, you can try different shades, starting from light or ash brown.
Honey Brown
Another popular shade of brown that looks awesome on dark-skinned women is honey brown. Below in a picture of Kelly Rowland in this shade.
Red Brown
Red brown is the variation of brown that you can try on if you have a dark skin tone. Below is how it looks like
Caramel browns will also look great on women and men of African American origin. Caramel is thought to be the mos natural color that is similar to the African American skin tone.
Other darker shades such as auburn, espresso, and honey brown also go well with this skin tone.
For highlights, it may not bring out the hue as you would like it to. There’s also, bronze, a rusty brown with a touch of sheen. It’s very similar to the coffee color.
Go for an ashy bronze brown if you want your hair to glisten. This will be great if you have a bronze skin. Create a deep brown base or an ashy brown one. This will help downplay the gold tones on your skin (if you have golden undertones) and create some balance.
Otherwise, you will end up with toomuch yellow or more of an orange tinge which is definitely not good.
Choosing the best brown shade can be just as hectic as choosing you next lipstick, sometimes they all look good, but not all of them look great on you.
Burgundy Hair on Dark Skin
Burgundy is a dark shade of brownish red that has a touch of purple to it. It is more of a cool color making it one of the best shades to wear during winter.
Burgundy hue is good for the dark skin tone because not only does it complement the skin, but they add a touch of sheen to the hair.
The bold tones of a beautiful burgundy come with great framing and contrast for cuties with a dark skin tone. There are quite a number of shades including;
- Cabarnet, a deep redder
- Claret, reddish color with hints of brown
- Cordovan, has more brown pigments than true burgundy
- Cranberry, has pink notes
Purple Hair on Dark Skin
Although it is a popular color for youths, clowns andHalloween, purple is the color you need right now to upgrade you look. One ofthe amazing things about it is that it looks nice for almost any skin tone.Shades of purple are fashionable, stunningly beautiful. easy to achieve.
Owing to the fact that you may need to bleach your hair first to obtain a perfect and long-lasting purple hair, it is still worth it. Following are purple-haired dark skins for your inspiration.
Silver Hair on Dark Skin
Silver hair color is one of the best for beauties with dark complexions. When done right, it can give you an ultramodern look. It versatile and complements a great many different styles and outfits.
However, Silver grey hair is probably one of the most difficult colors to get and maintain. The procedure to get silver is also known to be very damaging especially when done with the right person.
If none of the downsides bother you, you can still rock in this color just like the angels below
Ombre Hair Dark Skin
Ombre is quite big, and it comes withjust so many options to choose from. It is ridiculously cheap to maintain andyou can try many cheap hair color shades within its range.
Ombre introduces variety of highlights as opposed to a solid color on your natural hair. When you go for highlights of ombre on a dark skin tone, create a lot of texture in the ends of your hair to make it curly.
Generally, a dark skin tone willnaturally look best with deep chocolate brown and caramel ombre highlights. Tryit on especially if you do have hair with a good texture – thick or medium and curly.
Remember, it can be difficult tokeep naturally curly hair looking ombre because it tends to end up two-toned.Therefore, instead of just trying it for the best hair color for dark skin,think of doing highlights as your secret technique.
More Light Hair Colors for Dark Skin
In addition to silver grey and blonde, there are more light hair colors that look good on dark skin .They include lilac, yellow and pastels.
You can also choose lighter shades if you want to add some great radiance to your skin especially during summer.
If you are thinking of letting yourundertones speak for themselves, then a lighter shade will always do the trick.
- If you have dark brown eyes, then a lighter shade will work best for you too. This will help your eyes pop and visible. If you try on black hair, your eyes will be seriously downplayed, and will affect your overall outlook.
- Lighter highlights on brown skin or on yellow undertones will be great if you do not want to do a completely lightened hue. For example, you can do light blonde highlights on darker roots.
Following are more light hair ideas for dark skins.
Lilac Hair Color on Dark skin
lilac is one of the most recent trend in hair coloring industry. Its popularity is spreading quite fast. Being a light color, the results speak for themselves when done correctly on dark skin tone. Have a look at pics below.
Pastel Hair Colors
If you are not into blonde, pastelis the way to go. If your favoriteshades arelight blue and pale pink,you should definitely try out pastels.
Yellow Hair on Dark Skin
If you want to grab to maximum attention…like the ripe bananas in your local groceries, yellow hair is the way to go. This hue is attractive and it displays some sense of energy.
Thought not as common as the other colors in our list, shades of bright, neon, deep or mustard yellow can look cute on black girls.
Copper Hair Color for African American Hair
A lot of celebrities like Rihanna & SZA have been seen rocking in this vibrant color. According to Kasey, a Maryland-based hair colorist, copper brings warmth to your hair. This hair color is made up of the primary color red and yellow with a bit of blue.
Many hair colorists describe copper hair as the sassier sister to auburn and as the brighter and bubblier sister to burgundy. It’s a rich tone that comes with a bit of a zing, like a copper penny.
AfricanAmerican Hair ColorChart
Most beauty brands and companies have their own way to determine skin tone. As the charts(with 30 plus color ideas) below indicate, your skin can be fair, tan, medium, deep or dark depending on which company scaling chart you choose to use.
Which or above is the best? Of course, none is better than the other; all of them serve the same purpose. All you need is to keenly look at the colors and find out if it will match your skin. Purpose is also important, avoid ideas that won’t meet your purpose
Below is chart showing ideas for various skin tones in addition to dark
Tips to Determine your Perfect Hue
The dark skin tone has had multiple contradictions. Most of the ideas on this piece are based on African Americans…but dark skin is not limited to Africans or black people.
Beauty experts agree that dark skin typically means that your skin is a deep, rich brown color.
Generally, anyone not of European or white Americandescent is considered to have a dark skin; from the Asian olive skin,chocolate, tan, coffee, and black.
Something else to note is that darkness depends on thecountry where you live. For instance, in Africa,there are light-skinned as well as very dark-skinned individuals. Europeancountries do also have both dark and light skinned folks…hence it’s pointlessto argue over who is or isn’t dark.
If you are still not sure the exact shade you want to applyto your hair, here’s a quick guide on what you can do to help you decidefurther.
Know your Skin Undertone
Because you are a dark skin doesn’t wholly classify you tohave a warm undertone. For example, there are many dark skin individuals wholook great in silver, yet silver is meant to coincide with cool undertones. Soif you’re unsure about this, take a quick test to know which undertone youhave.
The common characteristics for warm undertones include;glowing skin, visible green veins, tans easily. For the cool undertones,however, they don’t tan easily, their veins aren’t as noticeable as they’re seento have pink undertones, and they have pale skin.
Cool undertones could shade their hair ashy and platinumblonde, jet black, or violet red. Colors such as honey or caramel brown couldappear dull. Warm undertones can rock rich Auburns, golden shades, butter andchampagne blonde: platinum colors could look odd with them.
Calculate how much you’re Willing to Spend
The reason this is important is because some dyes or shadeshave high maintenance attached to them a good example is ash brown. Dependingon your original hair color, you have to avoid some kinds of shampoo as theycan fade the color or remove it altogether.
Using toning shampoo could also change the appearance ofyour hair as they can remove the blue, green, or orange undertones in yourhair. Constant conditioning is also essential to maintain the sheen of yourhair; otherwise, the dye could damage your hair. You may also need heatprotectant and regular treatments that are costly.
If you can’t afford this kind of maintenance, you wouldinstead stick to simple hair dyed that are known to need low maintenance.
Two-toned Colors& Highlights
Always try highlights if you want tobe even more flattering. For example, if you dye your hair brown, bronze, lightred or auburn, consider trying blonde highlights. If you went with black hairor a deep brown shade, choose medium brown highlights.
One tip to remember is that your highlights shouldconcentrate around the face and the area on the top of your head in order toproduce more realistic and the most flattering looks.
Consider other Factors
Besides the costly side of things, you have to know whetherthe hair will suit you in terms of other factors – for example, yourpersonality. Burgundy as read above looks impressive with dark skin but becauseyour meek with yourself and you would rather not experiment, then maybe the jetblack option is best.
Your age could also be a factor as we seem people changetheir undertone when they age. While you looked great in light blonde, now itonly makes you look older.
Winter, Summer, Spring & Fall
There’s no perfect color that is tied to a certain season ofthe year. Trends keep evolving. All you need is to try any that you think maymatch your desires. Here some ideas
Winter is thought to be a season of contrasts hence darkerbrowns, reds and cool toned blondes will definitely not disappoint you.
Summer is the sun and beach season. As you transition fromspring, you can try, pink and purple blends, blonde shades with dark roots,bronde (blonde and brown) honey platinum or any light color.
As for fall/autumn, chestnut, rich auburns, honey brown,golden blonde, caramel tones, warm beige blonde did trend last year.
Finally, remember stick true toself… choosing the best shade for you can be nerve-wracking. If it’s not theprice; it’s how it looks or how it should be maintained.
But they did say beauty is painful and if you want to slay you have to be willing to go through the pain. With the dark skin tone, you can never really tell how something looks like till you try it.