The 20 Best Hair Color for Medium Skin Tones in 2024

Medium skin tones can look flawless with the right shades – hair colors that bring out the natural undertones in the skin and complement the colors in your eyes. The best hair color for medium skin isn’t a single shade.

There are tons of gorgeous hues you can wear to flatter your complexion without clashing with your skin! Check out some of our favorite color options and tips to finding the perfect tones in this guide. 

Let’s Talk About the Best Hair Color for Medium Skin

• Choose medium to dark shades that match your undertones
• Avoid super-light colors all-over; save them for balayage or highlights
• Add dimension with highlights, lowlights, root smudge, and more

What hair color looks best on me? We’ve all thought about it and found a few shades that get the job done, but maybe you haven’t stumbled upon your perfect color match just yet.

When you choose one of the best hair colors for medium skin, you’ll see just how big a difference it makes! The right hair color will give medium skin a creamy, flawless appearance while minimizing redness and skin imperfections.

It’ll bring out the color of your eyes and look like it could be a natural shade for you. Medium skin tones look amazing in a range of hair colors from blonde and red to brown and black.

Finding out which tones and shades will look best on your skin tone means taking a look at the very subtle tints (undertones) in your skin. For all-over color, you’ll look best in medium to dark shades of blonde, light to dark browns and reds, or silky black.

You’ll be able to pinpoint the most flattering shades by looking at your skin’s undertone (warm, cool, or neutral) and choosing shades that share those undertones.

We’ll talk more about this in just a bit! Avoiding super-light blonde shades all-over is key for medium skin tones. The medium depth of your skin is better suited for slightly richer tones that won’t wash you out.

If you love the way bright platinum, bubbly champagne blonde, or pale golden blonde look, just use those shades in balayage color or highlights instead of all-over color! 

In fact, using highlights, balayage, lowlights, root smudging, and ombre color are excellent ways to add a little more dimension and depth to create the best hair color for medium skin.

You don’t want flat, one-dimensional hues with your sun-kissed skin – use a spectrum of complementary colors in multi-toned looks to flatter a medium skin tone. If you want to go with all-over color, opt for sparkling shades with lots of dimension, like butterscotch, copper, or mahogany. 

Choosing Shades That Match Your Undertones

You know that your skin tone is medium – somewhere between fair and deep – but do you know what kind of undertone you have? Everyone’s skin has a subtle underlying tint that changes the overall tone of the skin.

These are your undertones, and they’re completely independent of your skin tone. It’s possible to have warm, cool, or neutral undertones with a medium skin tone. 

Medium skin with a warm (golden or peachy) undertone is going to look drastically different from medium skin with a cool (bluish or pinkish) or neutral (olive or balanced warm and cool) undertone.

Hair colors that clash with medium cool skin might look amazing on medium neutral or medium warm skin. This is why it’s important to find out what your undertones are if you want to get the most flattering hair color.

Determining the “color temperature” of your undertone will point you in the right direction for the best hair color for medium skin. Let’s take a look. 

Medium Skin With Warm Undertones

• Skin: Has a gold or peachy tint; veins appear greenish 
• Eyes: Brown, hazel, amber, with possible golden flecks
• Jewelry: Yellow gold, bronze, and copper look best
• Hair colors: Butterscotch, chocolate brown, copper, mahogany

Medium skin with warm undertones has an underlying peachy or golden tone that gives the skin a warm “sun tan” complexion. If you have warm undertones with medium skin, you’re likely to have brown, hazel, or amber eyes and may see golden flecks in your irises. 

A quick way to find your undertone is the jewelry test. Using a few different metals (yellow gold and silver make it easy), see which tones look best on your skin. If warm metallic tones like yellow gold, bronze, or copper look best, you probably have warm undertones! 

Choose colors that mirror those warm undertones to get a naturally flattering look. We love rich butterscotch blonde, milk chocolate brown, and copper red colors on medium warm skin. Take things a little deeper with dark chocolate, deep chestnut brown, or dimensional mahogany. 

Medium Skin With Cool Undertones

• Skin: Has a bluish or pinkish tint; veins appear bluish
• Eyes: Blue, green, gray, or deep brown
• Jewelry: Silver, white gold, and platinum look best
• Hair colors: Dark ash blonde, ash brown, plum burgundy, blue-black

Medium skin with cool undertones has an underlying bluish or pinkish tint that gives the skin an icy, muted overall tone. Medium cool skin tends to make the veins on the inner wrists appear bluish in color and the eyes are typically a cool-toned blue, green, gray, or deep brown color. 

The jewelry test makes it simple to tell if you have cool undertones with medium skin. Between warm and cool-toned metals like yellow gold and silver, which look best on your skin?

If it’s silver, white gold, or platinum, you’re likely cool-toned and will look great in colors on the cooler end of the spectrum. On cool medium skin, we love a dark ash blonde or ash brown (light to dark) with a beautiful silvery undertone.

Rich plum burgundy, with hints of cool violet and brown, is a great option for cool-toned medium skin. If you want deep, dark color that really makes your eyes pop, try a blue-black hair color.

Medium Skin With Neutral Undertones

• Skin: Has an olive or yellowish tint; veins appear bluish-green or undefined
• Eyes: Combination of warm and cool colors, possible golden flecks
• Jewelry: All metals look great, from yellow gold to silver
• Hair colors: Dark taupe blonde, auburn, mocha, espresso, true black

Medium skin tones can also have a neutral undertone, which may appear slightly olive green or yellowish in the skin. If you have a neutral undertone, you may note a bluish-green color in your veins or struggle to see your veins through your skin. 

The eye color is wide-ranging for neutral medium skin and can be any combination of warm and cool colors. You could have striking hazel eyes or pale brown with golden flecks.

It’s easier to narrow things down with the jewelry test on neutral skin. Those with medium neutral skin notice that all jewelry metals — yellow gold, silver, copper, etc. — look equally flattering on their skin.

This is because true neutral undertones feature both warm and cool tones, so almost all colors will suit these skin tones well. The same applies to hair colors. If you have medium neutral skin, you can choose almost any color without it clashing.

Colors that look especially flattering include neutral color options like dark taupe blonde, auburn red, mocha brown, espresso brown, and true black. Each of these shades features both warm and cool undertones, just like your skin! 

20 of the Best Hair Color for Medium Skin

Now that you’ve learned some of the shades and colors that look best on medium skin with your undertone (warm, cool, or neutral), let’s take a look at some examples! 

From dark blonde, bronde, red, brown, and black, there are a wide range of hair colors that look stunning on medium skin tones. Get inspired with ideas for your next color below! 

1. Deep Strawberry Golden Blonde

Faint copper undertones and an in-your-face golden warmth make this deep strawberry golden blonde color one of our favorites for medium skin.

It’s dimensional on its own with sparkle and shine, but adding very faint medium golden blonde balayage through the ends and midshaft will lift this warm color up. 

2. Espresso With Dark Golden Blonde Balayage

Subtle balayage faintly sweeps dark golden blonde up through the ends and into the midshaft zone in this dark espresso shade. If you have warm or neutral medium skin and want to experiment with a lighter color, dark golden blonde balayage is the way to do it! 

3. Medium Golden Blonde With Root Melt

While brighter shades of blonde can appear a little stark on darker medium skin tones, there’s an easy trick to make the color ultra-flattering: Darker roots! Here, a root melt blends dark blonde color into the lighter medium shade for a more natural look. This color combo is perfect for medium warm skin. 

4. Rooty Bronze With Espresso

This unique and eye-catching bronze shade has brown and golden undertones with the faintest hint of red. It’s balanced out with espresso color at the roots melting down into the color to expertly blend it. Try this look on warm medium skin for the most flattering results. 

5. Dark Chestnut Brown to Light Golden Brown Ombre

Putting a rich, deep color like chestnut brown with red undertones on top makes for a gorgeous ombre color graduation into light golden brown. These are both warm colors so it’s a look that suits medium skin with warm undertones very well. 

6. Dark Butterscotch Blonde

Warm, caramel-colored, and featuring reddish undertones like strawberry blonde, a dark butterscotch blonde offers a ton of dimension with a touch of brightness that looks great on medium skin. This is an intensely warm color, so consider it if you have warm undertones! 

7. Dimensional Golden Bronde

This blended color takes on a blonde/brown look overall, but is layered with light golden brown and dark golden blonde for a uniquely in-between tone. It’s perfect for medium skin with warm undertones. 

8. Multi-Toned Golden Auburn Brown

Want the most dimensional color? Use a few shades of colors that match your undertone for a stunning look that flatters your skin tone. Here, you’ve got golden blonde, auburn red, and medium chocolate brown working together to create a multi-toned warm look perfect for medium skin. 

9. Shimmering Medium Copper

Copper red is one of our favorite shades for medium warm skin because it’s so energetic and alive. It appears to shimmer and sparkle in the light, showing off its golden, red, and brown undertones in a spectrum of bold color. 

10. Light Mocha With Face-Framing Highlights

Mocha is a unique brown shade with cooler undertones, making it a good choice for medium skin with cool undertones. A light shade of mocha gets elevated with a few dark golden blonde highlights around the face. These warm-toned highlights brighten up the cool mocha and make this color great for cool or neutral undertones. 

11. Mocha With Cool Champagne Babylights

Mocha brown is a cool-toned brunette shade that looks stunning with a few faint champagne blonde highlights in the front. Babylights give this cool color a subtly sun-lightened look without warming the color up – perfect for medium skin with cool undertones. 

12. Dimensional Medium Ash Brown

Medium ash brown has an intriguing silvery undertone that gives the color an overall cool tint. This look is very dimensional on its own, so you won’t need highlights or balayage to liven it up (though those options would look gorgeous, too). Try this color on medium cool-toned skin.

Read Next: How to Tone Brown Hair to Ash

13. Dark Chocolate Brown

Dark chocolate tones are warm and deep, making it an inviting color for medium skin with warm undertones. This rich color looks great as an all-over shade, but subtle milk chocolate or chestnut-colored highlights would make it super dimensional. 

14. Auburn With Espresso Root Melt

Deep auburn red has brown and red undertones and skews slightly cooler on the color spectrum. Pairing it with an espresso root melt not only makes maintenance easier for dark-haired ladies with medium skin.

But it also brings some cooler and neutral tones into the mix. That makes this color perfect for medium skin with warm, cool, or neutral undertones! 

15. Bold Dark Mahogany

Mahogany is a pretty reddish brown shade with violet undertones that make it a cool or neutral color. With a dark color level, the richness is amazing and we love how shiny and bold this color shows up next to medium skin. 

16. Dark Chestnut to Espresso Sombre

Subtle ombre, or sombre, color is gorgeous on medium skin tones. It makes it possible to use 2 similar colors and give each of them equal space in your strands! Pop a reddish dark chestnut brown up top and let it fade gradually into a deep espresso tone near the ends for this neutral look. 

17. Espresso Light Golden Brown Ombre

We love using a combination of colors on medium skin tones to create a uniquely flattering blend with tons of dimension and depth.

The sultry espresso tones dominate the roots to midshaft here, fading out into a warm and lovely light golden brown through the ends. Try this ombre color on warm medium skin for a sun-kissed look!

18. Neutral Rich Espresso

Very dark brown hair colors are gorgeous on medium skin. This neutral espresso shade has both warm and cool characteristics, making it an almost universally flattering tone that warm, cool, and neutral undertones can rock beautifully.  

19. Enchanting Blue Black

Is any color more magical than a deep, silky blue black? This shade brings so much depth and shine with a notable blue undertone. That blue tone sends it into the cool color spectrum, while true black is a neutral color. 

20. Silky True Black

True black makes a bold statement and provides a lot of contrast and depth for medium skin tones. If you really want to make an impact and have neutral undertones, true black will likely suit you very well. It can also work for warm or cool undertones since black is a true neutral color. 

Things to Consider

You’ve learned about the different undertones medium skin can have and looked at the best colors to flatter your complexion. What else should you know to end up with color that compliments without clashing? Take a look at these tips and things to consider. 

• Consider the maintenance level. The color you choose will affect how often it needs to be touched up or refreshed to look its best. In general, red fades the fastest, with blonde in second place. Brown and black colors will stay vibrant longer and require less maintenance overall, so keep this in mind if you want easy-peasy color. 
• Don’t feel limited to natural colors. Fantasy colors that are anything but natural can look gorgeous on medium skin tones! You should still look at the shades that stay within the same color temperature as your undertones, whether that’s cool or warm. You might love the fresh change of rocking multicolored magenta, violet, or sapphire blue strands instead of natural shades! 
• Try colors that make your eyes pop. In this guide, we’ve focused on the hair colors that best medium skin tones based on your undertones (warm, cool, or neutral). Since your eye color tends to reflect your undertones, you might find it fun to check out hair colors that suit your eyes! Check out the best hair colors for green eyes, brown eyes, and hazel eyes to see even more color options. 
• Choose off-root color for fewer touch-ups. Balayage, teasylights, and ombre color will mean fewer root touch-ups over the life of your new color. If you want to go a little lighter with your new color on medium skin, getting a root melt or root smudge in a darker tone will make new root growth less obvious and buy more time in between touch-ups! 
• Switch to sulfate-free shampoo ASAP. If you’re planning on getting your hair colored, bleached, or both, you need to grab some sulfate-free shampoo first. You shouldn’t wash your newly dyed or bleached hair with sulfate-containing shampoo even once. Traditional shampoo strips color out of your hair and fades it so much faster. With sulfate-free, gentle shampoo, you’ll preserve your new color longer and do less damage to your strands! 

There’s no single best hair color for medium skin, but there are definitely a lot of beautiful color options that will flatter and complement your complexion!

If you choose your new color based on the color temperature of your undertones — warm, cool, or neutral — and keep maintenance in mind as you decide, you’ll end up with gorgeous color that makes your skin look flawless. 

Whether you’re thinking of going dark strawberry blonde with warm undertones or diving into a rich medium ash brown on the cooler end of the spectrum, you’ll find that choosing your next color based on your undertones gives it a naturally flattering look.