Depth and undertone are different things
People often mix up two separate qualities of skin color:
- Depth (or tone) is how light or dark the skin is. The chart above measures this.
- Undertone is the subtle hue underneath: warm (golden, peachy), cool (pink, rosy) or neutral. Two people with exactly the same depth can have opposite undertones.
Foundation shades, color analysis and even photo editing depend on both, which is why this page has a chart for depth and a separate finder for undertone.
About the Monk Skin Tone Scale
The ten swatches come from the Monk Skin Tone (MST) Scale, created by sociologist Dr. Ellis Monk and released openly by Google for research and product design. It was built to represent a wider range of skin tones than older scales, particularly deeper ones, and it is used in image datasets and inclusive product testing. Each swatch is the scale's representative color for that step, from #F6EDE4 (Monk 1) to #292420 (Monk 10).
The older Fitzpatrick scale, types I to VI, is often confused with a skin color chart. It actually classifies how skin reacts to sun: whether it burns or tans. Dermatologists use it to judge sun sensitivity, not to describe color.
Screens differ, so a swatch won't match your skin exactly on every display. Treat the chart as a reference for where you sit, not a precise match.
How the undertone finder reads a photo
When you tap your skin, the tool averages a small patch of pixels and converts it to CIELAB, a color space built around human vision. It then looks at the hue angle: lower angles mean more red and pink, higher ones more yellow and gold. We treat angles below about 52° as pink-leaning, above about 62° as golden-leaning, and everything between as neutral. These bands are a practical heuristic from typical skin measurements, not a medical or cosmetic standard.
The biggest source of error is the light. A warm lamp makes everyone look golden; shade on a cloudy day makes everyone look cool. That's why there's a Tap white paper step: hold plain printer paper in the same light, tap it, and the tool scales each channel so the paper becomes neutral. The sample picture shows the effect. Its skin reads neutral at first, but once the yellowish lamp light is corrected from the paper it moves clearly toward pink.
For the best reading:
- Use daylight from a window, not direct sun and not a lamp.
- Take off makeup and avoid flushed or tanned areas; the inner arm is often more reliable than the face.
- Turn off beauty filters and portrait modes, which shift skin color.
- Include white paper in the frame and tap it.
The four quick checks
The checks are the classic at-home tests, and none is perfect on its own:
- Vein color. Greenish veins usually suggest warm, bluish veins cool. It works less well on deeper skin, where veins are harder to see.
- Gold or silver. Many people simply prefer one metal, so judge by how your skin looks, not which you like.
- White or cream paper. Pure white flatters cool undertones; cream flatters warm ones.
- Natural cast. How your bare skin looks in daylight.
Your final result combines the checks with the photo reading. An uncorrected photo counts for half as much as one corrected with white paper, and if your answers disagree, the result tends toward neutral, which is honest: many people genuinely are neutral.
Olive skin
Olive skin has a greenish or grayish cast on top of a warm or neutral base, common in Mediterranean, Middle Eastern, Latin American and South Asian heritage. It often confuses undertone tests, because veins look green but gold jewelry can look harsh. If your results conflict and your skin looks slightly green-gray in daylight, olive is a likely answer; neutral-to-warm palettes usually suit it.
What to do with the result
- Foundation: match depth first, then pick the undertone version (often labelled W, C or N).
- Clothes and makeup: warm undertones usually suit golden, earthy colors; cool undertones suit blue-based colors. The seasonal color quiz combines undertone with depth and contrast to suggest one of twelve palettes.
- Testing colors: color analysis lets you hold virtual drapes next to your face using your camera.
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