The olive skin guide

How to tell if you have olive skin

Most people with olive skin find out by elimination: years of products and colors that almost work. Do these checks in daylight with a clean face. If three or more sound familiar, olive is the likely answer.

• Foundation never matches. Pink shades look grey and ashy, golden shades look orange.
• Pastels make you look tired. Baby pink and powder blue bring out a sallow, greenish tint.
• Cream looks cleaner on you than stark white, which can make your skin look yellow-green.
• You tan easily and rarely burn, then fade to a greyish beige in winter.
• Your skin looks slightly green or khaki in photos, especially under office lighting.
• People call you tan, Mediterranean or "hard to place" even when you're pale.
• Your wrist veins look green or blue-green. Warm skin shows green veins too, so treat this one as a supporting clue.

Warm, cool or soft olive

Olive describes the green tint. Underneath it, every olive complexion still leans warm or cool, and that lean decides your colors. Of the 21 olive-skinned celebrities we've analyzed, 14 land in warm Autumn seasons and 7 in cool Winter seasons. So the useful question is which olive you are.

The quickest test is metal. Hold gold jewelry to your bare face in daylight, then silver. If gold melts into your skin, you're warm olive. If silver does, you're cool olive. If neither stands out, you're soft olive, and muted colors will suit you best. To double-check, hold up a rust top and then a sapphire one: warm olive comes alive in the rust, cool olive in the blue.

Foundation for olive skin

Most foundation ranges are built on one axis, pink at one end and golden at the other. Olive skin sits off that axis. A pink base cancels the green into grey, the flat ashy mask where your face and neck look like they belong to different people. A strongly golden or peachy base adds orange to skin that already has yellow in it, and you get a line at the jaw by lunchtime.

The fix is a different undertone at the same depth. Shop by the undertone letter first and the depth number second. Warm olive: O first, then a W with a yellow base. Cool olive: O first, then N. Soft olive: O or N, avoiding anything strongly golden.

Swatch three stripes from cheek to jaw, one lighter, one matching, one deeper, and judge them by a window after ten minutes, once the formula has oxidized. The stripe that disappears is yours. Keep concealer in the same undertone family, and set with a translucent or yellow-toned powder, since white and pink powders flash grey on olive skin.

Shades worth swatching first: Fenty Beauty Pro Filt'r 225, 265, 345 and 425; Haus Labs Triclone 190 and 260; MAC Studio Fix Fluid in the NC range; and the olive-labeled shades in Lancôme Teint Idole Ultra Wear. Shade ranges change, so check each brand's current descriptions before you buy.

Best colors for olive skin

Olive skin needs depth. Pale or muddy colors sit too close to the green-gold cast, so the face loses definition and the green reads as tired. Deep, saturated colors stand apart from the skin and make the olive look like a glow.

Warm olive glows in burnt orange, moss, antique gold, wine and espresso. Cool olive sharpens in jet black, burgundy, sapphire, pine and magenta. Soft olive harmonizes with sage, khaki, soft teal, camel and dusty peach. Deep teal and wine-family reds flatter all three.

Colors olive skin should avoid

Pastel pink and baby blue are light and milky, so they wash out the green cast. Beige and greige are close to olive's own color, and the face blurs into the clothes. Mustard is the sneaky one: it feels like an earth tone, but its heavy yellow piles onto the yellow in olive skin. Warm olives who love mustard should reach for antique gold, which is deeper and browner.

• Warm olive: cool pastels, optic white and pure grey flatten you.
• Cool olive: warm beige, honey and pumpkin make you look sallow.
• Soft olive: pure black, optic white and bright brights overpower you.

Makeup for olive skin

The green-gold cast changes how color sits on olive skin. Light, milky pinks mix with it and go grey. Bright oranges pile onto the yellow and look muddy. What works is color with enough depth to stand apart: warm brick, berry, bronze.

Warm olive wants golden depth: copper, bronze and olive eyeshadow, brick lips. Cool olive wants blue-based depth: charcoal, plum and pine eyeshadow, deep red lips. Soft olive wants everything slightly muted: soft gold, camel and warm taupe.

Bronzer is where olive skin goes orange fastest. Pick one with a brown or olive base, no more than two shades deeper than your skin. For contour, a cool taupe works on nearly every olive because it mimics a real shadow. Light olive should keep contour soft, since it already leans ashy.

Blush for olive skin

A blush has to stand apart from your skin to read as a flush. Pale blushes sit almost level with olive skin, and pink mixes with the green and goes chalky. Choose a blush noticeably deeper than your skin.

Warm olive glows in apricot, peach and terracotta. Cool olive looks flushed in berry, raspberry and cool rose. Soft olive looks natural in dusty peach and rosewood. If you're unsure, a warm rose sits between the two and suits most olive skin. Cream blushes and pigmented powders, placed high on the cheekbone and built in thin layers, last best.

Lipstick for olive skin

Pale, chalky lipsticks pick up the grey in olive skin, so the lips look washed out and the face looks tired. Shades with real pigment stand apart from the skin, so the mouth reads as color.

The nude that works on olive skin is one or two shades deeper than your natural lips, with a caramel or rosy-brown base. Warm olive suits caramel, toffee and peachy-brown nudes; cool olive suits rosewood and mauve-brown. If a nude looks right in the tube but grey on your mouth, line one shade deeper and press the nude on top.

Red is one of the most flattering lip colors for olive skin when its temperature matches yours. A deep, true red that leans neither orange nor pink suits most olive skin.

Nail colors for olive skin

Hands show the olive cast more than the face, because there's no foundation on them. Milky pinks and beige nudes sit right next to that cast and make it look greyer by contrast. Pigmented shades give the eye a clear color to land on, and the skin around them reads warm and even.

Warm olive: toasted almond, caramel, brick, rust, wine and espresso. Cool olive: rosewood, cherry, berry, plum, oxblood and black. Soft olive: dusty rose, warm taupe and soft brick. Dark polish is where olive hands shine, and an olive green or deep emerald nail in autumn echoes the green in your skin.

Hair color for olive skin

Depth matters most. Hair close to your skin in lightness blurs into it, and the face loses its edges. Hair with real depth frames the skin and makes the olive read as a glow. Every one of the 21 olive-skinned celebrities we've analyzed wears her hair somewhere between medium brown and black.

Inside that dark range, the undertone picks the tone. Warm olive glows in espresso, dark chocolate, chestnut, deep auburn and caramel. Cool olive sharpens in blue-black, soft black, cool espresso and burgundy brown. Soft olive looks best in milk chocolate, mushroom brown, soft caramel and bronde.

Caramel balayage works on olive skin because it adds light around the face while the darker base keeps the contrast. Keep the base at your natural depth and paint the caramel in ribbons around the face and ends. The two shades that most often go wrong are icy platinum, which turns olive skin grey, and brassy yellow or orange, which makes it look sallow.

Blonde and red hair on olive skin

Olive skin can go blonde. Shakira, Jennifer Lopez and Beyoncé all wear honey and caramel blonde on golden skin. The safe zone is the middle of the blonde range: honey, caramel and toffee for warm olive, neutral beige and soft mushroom for cool olive, bronde and dark blonde for soft olive. Start with balayage, keep the root a shade or two darker, and tone every few weeks so it never turns brassy.

Red works on olive skin when it's deep. Red and green sit opposite each other on the color wheel, so a rich red balances the green in olive skin and makes the face look lit. Warm olive suits mahogany, deep auburn, dark copper and cinnamon. Cool olive suits burgundy and black cherry. Soft olive suits a brown-based auburn. Bright orange copper and strawberry blonde are the hardest reds for olive skin. Stay within two levels of your natural depth, and test with a gloss before committing.

Light olive skin

Light olive skin is a fair to light complexion with a green-gold cast. Most people picture olive as medium or tan, so light olive usually gets filed as fair, pale or sallow. You see it as beige or faintly green where fair skin would look pink, and as a grey cast when you wear the wrong colors near your face. Fair, pale and light olive are the same skin type at slightly different depths, and they shop the same way.

Light olive is the hardest version to match, because the lighter a foundation range gets, the pinker it tends to be. Start with a brand's lightest olive shade, such as Haus Labs Triclone 190 or Fenty Pro Filt'r 130 and 145, then its lightest neutral. If a shade matches in depth but reads slightly rosy, a drop of olive or green mixing adjuster pulls it back toward your cast.

For blush, choose soft peach and apricot if you're warm and cool rose if you're cool. For hair, dark brunette, chocolate and neutral light brown look clearest. If you go blonde, choose beige or honey with a darker root. Aubrey Plaza, Lucy Liu, Bella Hadid, Kourtney Kardashian and Mandy Moore are the lightest olive complexions we've analyzed.

Deep olive skin

Deep olive skin is a medium-deep to dark complexion with a green-gold cast under the surface. It reads golden-brown in sun and slightly khaki in cool light. The deeper olive skin gets, the more the green hides, so it often gets called tan, brown or warm. The olive only shows up when something goes wrong: an orange foundation, a muddy red lipstick, a camel coat that turns the skin grey-green.

Deep foundation ranges tend to split into red-based and golden-orange shades. Deep olive needs a third option: a neutral or olive base with a yellow-green lean, labeled O or N. If a deep shade matches your depth but looks orange, mix in a drop of olive adjuster. If it looks ashy, it's probably too red for you.

Deep olive almost always lands in a Deep season and holds rich, saturated color easily: spice, wine and jewel tones with gold if you're warm, black, jewel tones and crisp white with silver if you're cool. Espresso, soft black and dark chocolate are the natural hair partners. Light blondes are the hardest, because the gap between hair and skin makes the skin look greener.

Gold or silver for olive skin

A metal reacts to the base under the olive cast. Gold echoes a warm base and makes the skin look golden. Silver echoes a cool base and makes the skin look clear. On the wrong base, each metal shows up the green: bright yellow gold makes cool olive look sallow, and shiny silver makes warm olive look grey.

Rose gold sits between the two and is a safe pick for soft and neutral olive. Mixing metals works when one leads: wear your best metal close to the face, in earrings and necklaces, and save the other for rings and watches. Brushed and matte finishes flatter olive skin more than high shine.

Olive skin with brown, hazel or green eyes

Brown eyes are the most common olive combination: 14 of the 21 olive-skinned celebrities we've analyzed have them. Brown eyes carry the same warm pigment as the gold in olive skin, and with dark hair they create the contrast the Deep seasons are built on. Plum and aubergine eyeshadow make brown eyes look brightest, and bronze and olive tie the eye into the skin. Espresso liner looks softer than black on warm olive.

Green and hazel eyes come in two kinds. Golden-green and amber-flecked eyes lean warm and usually sit in an Autumn season, like Eva Mendes and Lana Del Rey. Clearer or grey-green eyes with cool olive skin and dark hair usually land in Deep Winter, like Gal Gadot and Aubrey Plaza. Red-based shades sit opposite green, so plum, burgundy, copper and rosy bronze shadow make green eyes look greener.

Celebrities with olive skin

Put the 21 olive-skinned celebrities we've analyzed side by side and three patterns jump out. Every one has a green-gold cast under the skin. Every one has hair between medium brown and black. And 16 of the 21 land in a Deep season, because dark hair against olive skin creates the contrast that Deep Autumn and Deep Winter are built on. None lands in a Spring or Summer season.

A celebrity with your coloring is a shortcut to a palette that's already been tested on camera. Match depth first, then temperature, then borrow her palette.

Common olive skin myths

• "Olive skin is always dark." Light olive is common and often goes unnoticed for years.
• "Green veins mean olive." Warm undertones show green veins too. The foundation test is more reliable.
• "Olive is a fourth undertone." Olive is a cast on top of a warm or cool base, and that base decides your colors.
• "Only people from the Mediterranean have olive skin." Olive skin shows up across Latin American, Middle Eastern, South Asian, East Asian and mixed backgrounds.
• "A green undertone means something's wrong." It's normal. The cast can look stronger when you're tired, in winter or under fluorescent light, but the undertone itself stays the same.