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Bright Winter vs Deep Winter: how to tell which you are

By the Skintonic team · SKINTONIC LLC · Updated

The question between Bright Winter and Deep Winter is how dark your coloring runs overall, and nothing else. Both are cool undertone and strong contrast, which is why the same person can be told both at different times. Bright Winter sits in the medium range and Deep Winter in the deep one, and getting that wrong is what makes a palette feel either heavy or washed out.

Bright Winter and Deep Winter also differ on chroma (clear against moderate), though that is the smaller gap and not the one people get stuck on. What follows is the Bright Winter palette against the Deep Winter one, three depth tests you can run at home with things you already own, and what each of the two looks like in a mirror. If you would rather not work it out by hand, the scan measures all four factors from one photo and tells you whether you are Bright Winter or Deep Winter.

The one factor

Depth. Bright Winter is medium; Deep Winter is deep. Bright Winter and Deep Winter share cool undertone and strong contrast, which is why the two get swapped so easily.

Bright Winter against Deep Winter

Six colors from the Bright Winter palette and six from the Deep Winter one, the metal each wears, and the direction each one's neutrals run. The Bright Winter column and the Deep Winter column are both drawn from the season data the app itself uses, so these are the swatches the free result would hand you rather than an approximation of them.

Bright Winter

cool · medium · strong contrast · clear

  • Shocking Pink
  • Electric Blue
  • Bright Violet
  • True Red
  • Emerald
  • Turquoise
Best metal
Bright / polished silver
Neutrals run
black, pure white and cool charcoal
Typical coloring
Hair somewhere in the middle, usually medium brown, eyes that read as bright and defined against the face, and skin that leans pink, olive or blue-toned. Usually a wide gap between the lightest and the darkest parts of the face.

Deep Winter

cool · deep · strong contrast · moderate

  • Black
  • Deep Emerald
  • Wine
  • Royal Purple
  • True Red
  • Emerald
Best metal
Silver
Neutrals run
black, charcoal and pure white
Typical coloring
Hair that runs dark — deep brown through to near-black, eyes that read as clear without being striking, and skin that leans pink, olive or blue-toned. Usually a wide gap between the lightest and the darkest parts of the face.

Three tests that separate Bright Winter from Deep Winter

All three test depth, because depth is the only thing in question between Bright Winter and Deep Winter. Do all three at a window: an indoor bulb will quietly push the answer toward whichever of Bright Winter and Deep Winter you were already hoping for, and there is no way to notice that it has while you are looking.

1. Photograph yourself in black and white

Depth is lightness and nothing else, so stripping the color out is the quickest way to tell Bright Winter from Deep Winter: take a plain photo at a window, convert it to grayscale, and look at where your hair sits against your skin. The deep of Bright Winter and Deep Winter reads noticeably darker overall; the medium one keeps more of its light range.

2. Charcoal against a mid gray

Hold a very dark neutral near your face, then a middling one, and watch which way a Bright Winter or Deep Winter face goes. Deep Winter takes the charcoal without being flattened by it; on Bright Winter the same charcoal takes over and the features retreat behind it. It is the clearest single signal Bright Winter and Deep Winter give you.

3. Check your natural hair against your eyebrows

Not for the color but for the level: when your hair and brows both sit low on the light-to-dark scale that is depth, and it points at the deep of Bright Winter and Deep Winter. When both sit high and the brows nearly vanish in soft light, it points at the medium one, which here is Bright Winter.

Still not sure between Bright Winter and Deep Winter?

Each test above reads one factor by eye, and depth by eye is exactly where Bright Winter and Deep Winter go wrong. The scan reads all four — undertone, depth, contrast and chroma — from a single photo, shows you the three colors it took off your face so you can correct them, and names which of the two you are. It runs in your browser, the photo is never uploaded, and seeing your type costs nothing.

Find out which one I am — free

Questions about this pair

Can you be both Bright Winter and Deep Winter?

No — the analysis returns one of the two — but Bright Winter and Deep Winter sit close enough together that, if you are near the line, either palette covers most of a wardrobe. Bright Winter and Deep Winter share cool undertone and strong contrast, so a good part of the two color lists overlaps. Where it starts to matter is the depth end of each one, which is where Bright Winter and Deep Winter stop overlapping.

Does depth change over time?

Depth does, and more than people expect — enough that one person can genuinely be Bright Winter at thirty and Deep Winter at sixty. Hair lightens or greys and the depth of the whole face moves with it, so between Bright Winter and Deep Winter this is worth looking at again every few years.

What if I dress as Bright Winter and I am really Deep Winter?

Nothing dramatic, which is worth saying plainly — Bright Winter and Deep Winter are neighbors rather than opposites. A handful of shades will look slightly off under your chin and the rest will be fine, because Bright Winter and Deep Winter overlap everywhere except at the depth extremes. The giveaway is at the depth extreme, where the Bright Winter colors furthest along that axis are the first to stop working on a Deep Winter face.

Keep going

Bright Winter in full · Deep Winter in full · Take the quiz instead · All season comparisons · All 12 seasons