Colored Pencils: A Complete Beginner’s Guide to the Best Colored Pencils — Art is Fun

Brands

When comparing brands, you’ll find that they all have a unique combination of price, consistency, permanence, color range, and pigment concentration. Some brands are objectively better than others, but when it comes to the leading brands, much of the difference comes down to personal taste.

In general, my favorite brands are Prismacolor, Caran d’Ache, Faber-Castell, and Derwent. They have proven track records and offer high-quality artist grade products.

Because different colored pencils of every type can be used together on the same artwork, you needn’t feel pressured to pick a brand and stick to it. It’s a good idea to buy a few individual pencils from different brands, so that you can try them out and see what you like. Once you discover a particular brand that you prefer, it may be worth the investment to buy a set.

Best Colored Pencils

I’ve provided links below to the relevant products so that you can easily find them on Blick Art Materials, my favorite art supplier. If you make a purchase after clicking on one of these links, I’ll receive a small commission (at no extra cost to you). Read my disclosure statement to learn more.

When buying art supplies I prefer to shop from Blick because you know you’ll get authentic products from respected art brands. Buying from Amazon can sometimes be a mixed bag because many products are sold by third-party sellers who might sell imitation products of questionable quality or even counterfeit products disguised as name brands. Thankfully that’s never a problem when buying from an established art supplier like Blick!

My overall pick are the Prismacolor Premier Soft Core Colored Pencils, which represent the best combination of price and performance for most people.

I own and enjoy numerous brands of colored pencils, but I’ve been using Prismacolors the longest: 25 years! I have the 132-pencil set and they are what I reach for most frequently when creating art with colored pencils.

Prismacolors are among the softest colored pencils you can buy, and I love their creamy consistency. The huge range of 150 colors, which can be purchased individually or in sets, are vibrant and blend easily. They’re also cheaper than many other artist grade pencils and are widely available in stores.

But they’re not perfect: their softness means they won’t hold a point as well as harder pencils, which can be an annoyance for artists who enjoy detailed work. To counter this problem I also have a set of the Prismacolor Verithin pencils that work well with the Soft Core pencils whenever I need a sharp point for details. However, as proof that you can still achieve amazing detail with soft Prismacolors, check out this artwork by Morgan Davidson that she was able to create with just a 12-color set!

Another gripe with the Prismacolors is that their softness means you’ll have to sharpen them more often, and they can be prone to breakage, so treat them with care. Their lightfastness also isn’t as good as more expensive brands (like Caran d’Ache), likely a result of Prismacolor’s such competitive prices (the best pigments are expensive!).

My pick for best oil-based colored pencils are the Faber-Castell Polychromos Pencils. I have the complete set of 120 pencils and they’re a joy to use. They exceed the Prismacolors in several areas (permanence, durability), but cost quite a bit more. Check these out if you’re worried about wax bloom or the Prismacolors are too soft for your liking.

My upgrade pick are the Caran d’Ache Luminance Pencils. These wax-based pencils are arguably the best colored pencils you can buy, but also the most expensive. In return for their higher prices, you get higher quality pigments that are more lightfast and wonderfully vibrant. They’re not as soft as the Prismacolors (but still quite smooth and creamy), and they suffer from less wax bloom. Unless you’re a professional artist or blessed with a bottomless budget, these are overkill, but I couldn’t help mentioning them as la crème de la crème.

My budget pick are the Prismacolor Premier Soft Core Colored Pencils. As discussed above, these pencils are not without their flaws, but the value for money they offer is hard to beat. I haven’t discussed prices much in this article because they tend to fluctuate (and Blick always has sales), but at the time of writing, you can get a set of 24 Prismacolors for between $20 to $25! Given what you can achieve with these pencils, that’s a bargain!