How to Find Your Skin Undertone at Home (4 Simple Tests)

Why Undertone Matters

Undertone is the subtle, underlying hue beneath your skin's surface colour. Unlike your skin tone (which changes with tanning, ageing, and the seasons), your undertone is fixed. It's determined by the pigments in your skin at the deepest level and doesn't change over your lifetime.

Understanding your undertone is the single most important step in seasonal colour analysis. The colours that flatter you most are almost always those that share your undertone — warm colours for warm undertones, cool colours for cool undertones.

The Four Tests

Test 1: The Vein Test

Look at the veins on the inside of your wrist in natural daylight.

• Blue or purple veins: Cool undertone
• Green veins: Warm undertone (the green is yellow pigment combining with the blue of the vein)
• Blue-green, or you genuinely can't tell: Neutral undertone

This test works best in natural light (indoor lighting distorts colours significantly). It's less reliable on very dark skin tones, where the vein colour can be harder to read.

Test 2: The Jewellery Test

Hold a piece of silver jewellery against your face, then a piece of gold jewellery. Look in a mirror in natural light.

• Silver makes your skin look clearer and more radiant: Cool undertone
• Gold makes your skin glow: Warm undertone
• Both look equally good: Neutral undertone

This is one of the most reliable tests and works across all skin tones. Use plain metal — avoid gemstones or stones, which add their own colour.

Test 3: The White Test

Hold a pure white piece of fabric next to your face, then hold a warm cream or ivory fabric. Which one makes your skin look better?

• Pure white looks harmonious and clear: Cool undertone
• Cream or ivory looks more natural: Warm undertone
• Both look reasonably good: Neutral undertone

This test is particularly useful because it directly demonstrates what you'll experience when choosing between white and cream clothing.

Test 4: The Sun Test

How does your skin respond to sun exposure?

• Burns easily, rarely tans, or tans to a pinkish colour: Cool undertone
• Tans quickly and deeply, rarely burns, or golden-tans: Warm undertone
• Burns sometimes but tans eventually: Neutral undertone

This test is less precise than the others (it's also affected by Fitzpatrick skin type), but it can be a useful supporting data point when other tests are inconclusive.

Warm, Cool, or Neutral?

Most colour analysis systems work with three undertone categories:

Warm: Your skin has yellow, golden, peachy, or olive undertones. You look best in colours with warm yellow-based undertones — earth tones, warm oranges, golden yellows, warm reds. Gold jewellery suits you.

Cool: Your skin has pink, rosy, red, or bluish undertones. You look best in colours with cool blue-based undertones — jewel tones, cool blues and greens, true reds, cool pinks. Silver jewellery suits you.

Neutral: Your skin has a mix of both warm and cool undertones, or neither strongly. You can wear a wider range of colours — both warm and cool palettes work, though you'll still have personal preferences.

How Undertone Connects to Your Season

In seasonal colour analysis, undertone is one of three dimensions (alongside depth and chroma) that determines your season:

• Cool undertone: Summer or Winter seasons
• Warm undertone: Autumn or Spring seasons
• Neutral undertone: May fall into a "neutral" season like Soft Summer, Soft Autumn, or Light Summer

Once you know your undertone, you can narrow down from 12 seasons to 6, and then use depth (light vs dark) and chroma (muted vs clear) to find your exact season.

Discover your exact season with Lumina's AI analysis →