Brown paint in acrylic, oil and watercolor, compared

Recipes by medium

Checked August 2026

Generic pigment ratios, the same ones the Chromilla mixer solves for. Open the mixer to swap in your own brand and tubes.

Common mistakes when mixing brown

Brown is what you get from mixing complementary colors together, not from a special 'brown' recipe, and painters who reach straight for a tube brown miss how much range is available by mixing their own from a red and a green, or an orange and a blue. Mixing your own also means the brown relates properly to the rest of your palette instead of sitting apart as an unrelated color. If your brown looks muddy in a bad way rather than a good way, you likely have too many pigments fighting each other, aim for two or three, not four or five.

Answer page: what colors make brown

Exact single-medium recipes

Straight-to-the-ratio versions of brown in each medium, from the Chromilla mix library.

• Brown in acrylic
• Brown in oil
• Brown in watercolor

Why the three mediums differ for brown

• acrylic carries a 10% value shift on drying in Chromilla's model (dries slightly darker and a touch warmer), so the acrylic mix is predicted to dry to #67462D.
• oil dries true to color in Chromilla's model, so the oil mix is predicted to dry to #6F4E34.
• watercolor carries a 8% value shift on drying in Chromilla's model (dries slightly darker and a touch cooler), so the watercolor mix is predicted to dry to #654832.
• In watercolor the paper is the white, so lighter versions come from adding water rather than white paint.

Acrylic recipe in detail

Variations on Brown (acrylic)

Each variation is its own target (lighter and darker move OKLCH lightness by 0.08; warmer and cooler turn the hue 12 degrees toward red or blue), solved fresh.

Brown questions

What two colors make brown?

Chromilla's acrylic recipe uses 3 tubes rather than two: 74% Burnt Umber, 21% Titanium White and 5% Ivory Black. Burnt Umber leads the mix. Chromilla's model predicts a 93% dry match against the target, scored against its own color model, not a measured paint-out.

How do you make brown paint lighter without losing the hue?

Re-balance the mix instead of only adding white. For a lighter brown (#87644D) in acrylic, Chromilla mixes 3 parts Viridian Green, 1 part Cadmium Red and 1 part Titanium White. Chromilla's model predicts a 90% dry match against the target, scored against its own color model, not a measured paint-out.

Why does brown look different when acrylic dries?

Acrylic binder looks milky while wet and clears as it dries, so the dried film reads darker. Chromilla's model applies a 10% value shift for acrylic, so the wet mix #6F4E34 is predicted to dry to about #67462D. Dries slightly darker and a touch warmer.

What is the hex code for brown?

Chromilla uses #6F4E37 as the target for brown. The acrylic recipe is predicted to dry to about #67462D.

Related colors

More colours to try once you have brown sorted.

• How to make Chestnut paint/guides/how-to-mix-chestnut
• How to make Mahogany paint/guides/how-to-mix-mahogany
• How to make Rust paint/guides/how-to-mix-rust
• How to make Taupe paint/guides/how-to-mix-taupe
• How to make Ochre paint/guides/how-to-mix-ochre