How to find your
perfect lip color

1. Undertone — the one that matters most

Undertone is the colour underneath your skin: warm (yellow, peach, gold), cool (pink, red, blue) or neutral (a balance of both). It does not change when you tan, and it is not the same as your surface colour. It is the reason two people can wear the same red and only one of them look right in it.

How to test it, in daylight

Look at the veins on the inside of your wrist. Hold a gold earring to one side of your face and a silver one to the other. Then hold pure white and cream fabric under your chin. Two of the three agreeing is your answer — and if all three disagree, you are neutral, which is the easiest place to be.

2. Depth — how much pigment you actually want

Depth is a choice, not a rule. The same colour reads completely differently sheer, buildable or full — and this is where a custom lip color beats a swatch on a screen.

3. Finish — matte, satin or glossy

Finish changes the light, and the light changes everything. It is the last question, and the easiest one.

Want more light? Custom Lip Gloss — your exact shade, high shine, $20.

Nothing on the shelf matches? That is the whole point.

Undertone, depth and finish give you a direction. They do not give you the colour in your head — the very specific brown, the one your grandmother wore, the exact berry from a photograph, the shade that got discontinued. That gap is what we exist for: a custom lipstick blended to your shade, one order at a time.

Send it as a description, a photo, a swatch, a HEX code or plain words. We blend your custom lip color after you order — nothing is blended before you ask for it — and we record the recipe pigment by pigment, so reordering your exact shade is one tap instead of a guess. That record is the shade vault, and it is yours.

Six ways to describe your colour

You do not need a shade name. Any one of these is enough for us to blend from — and if what we read back is wrong, we ask before anything is mixed.

Everything travels with your order into the checkout — or email hello@10millionshades.com and a person reads it.

Shade questions, answered

How do I find my undertone?

Three tests, done in daylight: the vein colour on your inner wrist (green = warm, blue or purple = cool, blue-green = neutral), whether gold or silver flatters your face more, and whether pure white or cream sits better under your chin. Two of three agreeing is your answer.

What lip color suits a warm undertone?

Coral, peach, brick, terracotta, tomato red, warm brown and golden nude. If you are warm and you want a custom shade, aim the description at the peach-gold side rather than the blue-red side — a warm undertone turns a cool red slightly purple, and a warm red slightly orange.

What lip color suits a cool undertone?

Berry, cherry, plum, wine, true burgundy, rose, cool pink and blue-red. Cool undertones carry depth beautifully, which is why wine and oxblood read as elegant rather than heavy on cool skin.

How do I describe a lip color I cannot name?

A photo taken in daylight, a swatch on paper, an object in the exact colour, a HEX or RGB code from any colour picker, or plain words such as cool-toned brown, soft matte, not too pink. All of them work. You do not need the right words — you need something we can read, and we confirm it back before blending.

Can you make my own lipstick color from a discontinued shade?

Yes. Send the name, a photo of the bullet, or the last tube you are still scraping out, and we match a custom lip gloss shade or a full custom lipstick to it. Your recipe is kept in the shade vault so the reorder is exact.

How much does a custom lipstick cost?

A Custom Lip Color is $24 ($32 regular). A $9 trial shade tests the match before you commit to full size. A personalized lip gloss is $20, and a three-shade Shade Discovery Trio is $58. Blending starts after you order.

Any color you want — is that literal?

Yes. If you can describe it, we can blend it. If what you describe turns out to be beautiful on paper and wrong on you, the $9 trial exists precisely so you find that out cheaply.