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Season comparison

Cool Summer vs Cool Winter: how to tell which you are

By the Skintonic team · SKINTONIC LLC · Updated

Cool Summer and Cool Winter agree on cool undertone. Where Cool Summer and Cool Winter part company is contrast: how much distance sits between the lightest and the darkest parts of your face. Cool Summer reads as medium and Cool Winter as strong, and that single difference changes whether you look best in one tone throughout or in something that separates.

Cool Summer and Cool Winter also differ on chroma (moderate against clear) and depth (medium against deep), though that is the smaller gap and not the one people get stuck on. What follows is the Cool Summer palette against the Cool Winter one, three contrast 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 Cool Summer or Cool Winter.

The one factor

Contrast. Cool Summer is medium; Cool Winter is strong. Cool Summer and Cool Winter share cool undertone, which is why the two get swapped so easily.

Cool Summer against Cool Winter

Six colors from the Cool Summer palette and six from the Cool Winter one, the metal each wears, and the direction each one's neutrals run. The Cool Summer column and the Cool 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.

Cool Summer

cool · medium · medium contrast · moderate

  • Deep Raspberry
  • Blueberry
  • Plum
  • Cool Teal
  • Cool Burgundy
  • Raspberry
Best metal
Silver
Neutrals run
cool gray, soft white and slate
Typical coloring
Hair somewhere in the middle, usually medium brown, eyes that read as clear without being striking, and skin that leans pink, olive or blue-toned. Usually a moderate gap between hair and skin.

Cool Winter

cool · deep · strong contrast · clear

  • True Red
  • Royal Purple
  • Deep Emerald
  • Deep Navy
  • Black
  • Royal Blue
Best metal
Silver
Neutrals run
black, pure white and charcoal
Typical coloring
Hair that runs dark — deep brown through to near-black, 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.

Three tests that separate Cool Summer from Cool Winter

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

1. The squint test

Stand at a mirror in daylight and half close your eyes until the detail drops out of Cool Summer and Cool Winter alike. Cool Winter keeps its features separate — you can still see where the hair stops and the face starts — while Cool Summer blurs into a single tone. That blur, or the absence of it, is the whole of what separates Cool Summer from Cool Winter.

2. Black and white together

Put a true black and a pure white against your face at once — a striped shirt separates Cool Summer from Cool Winter as well as anything. Cool Winter looks deliberate in it; Cool Summer looks like the clothes are having an argument the face is not part of.

3. A tonal outfit

Now the reverse of the test above: three pieces all within a shade or two of each other, on a Cool Summer or Cool Winter frame. Cool Winter looks expensive in this, and Cool Summer looks slightly washed out, as though a piece went missing. Whichever of Cool Summer and Cool Winter reads better on you in it is the one you are.

Still not sure between Cool Summer and Cool Winter?

Each test above reads one factor by eye, and contrast by eye is exactly where Cool Summer and Cool 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 Cool Summer and Cool Winter?

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

Does contrast change over time?

Contrast moves whenever the gap between your hair and your skin moves, so dye changes it at once and greying changes it slowly — easily enough to carry you between Cool Summer and Cool Winter. A Cool Summer or Cool Winter result describes you as you are today, which is also how everyone is seeing you today.

What if I dress as Cool Summer and I am really Cool Winter?

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

Keep going

Cool Summer in full · Cool Winter in full · Take the quiz instead · All season comparisons · All 12 seasons