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Lee has over two decades of hands-on experience remodeling, fixing, and improving homes, and has been providing home improvement advice for years.
Updated on 03/29/24
Paint color and finish is a choice you want to get right from the start. When you order paint for your walls, you're asking a store to make a highly unique product just for you. If the color's wrong, quality paint is so expensive that it's tough to write off the cost.
Learn more about paint swatches and samples, including where to get them and how to use them before committing to a larger quantity for your project.
Applying liquid paint samples or affixing paint swatches to your walls is the best way to ensure that paint really will work for you. Paint swatches are the color of paint printed on strips of paper that can be found in any paint or home improvement store. They are usually free and can help narrow down a color choice before you move on to the actual paint itself.
Paint samples often are not the actual paint that you would purchase in larger quantities. Paint manufacturers thin out the paint in samples, imbuing it with fewer solids that produce true paint build. Pigments are accurate, though. Paint samples or testers are bottles of liquid paint ranging from 2 ounces to 8 ounces that are applied directly to your wall or to a piece of white foam board or scrap drywall. Online paint visualizers are also helpful.
Even before ordering paint samples from a specific paint company, you may want to check out Samplize. Samplize is not a paint company but a third-party provider that offers large paint samples from major paint companies. Samplize's current paint companies include:
Two coats of sample paint are applied to 9" x 14.75" squares for a true look. Low-stick adhesive lets you apply the squares to your walls. They actually offer dozens of curated paint collections that can help guide your vision, sharing ideas for themes, rooms, styles, and painting surfaces.
Or, if you're unsure what you're looking for, you could opt to order a bundle of their top 8 selling paint colors in a specific color family.
You can find Behr and Glidden paint samples from Home Depot in-store or online in 8-ounce sizes. Free Behr and Glidden liquid paint samples are not available, but small color swatches as loose cards are free. For professional painters and designers, color fans displaying thousands of colors are available for purchase. While Samplize doesn't represent Behr, Home Depot does offer Samplize.
Online or in-store, Benjamin Moore offers pint sizes of liquid paint color samples for purchase from its collection of over 3,000 colors. Eight-inch-long paint swatches can be purchased for about $2 per swatch. You'll also find Benjamin Moore colors available on Samplize.
Boutique paint company Country Chic Paint frequently runs free paint sample programs. Keep an eye on their site or on Facebook to catch these promotions when they occur.
Dunn Edwards will provide up to 100 free color cards from its selection of thousands of Perfect Palette colors. Plus, 8-ounce paint samples are available for purchase at Dunn Edwards' online store.
Dutch Boy's paint sample program offers you four times more paint than traditional 8-ounce samples with its Twist & Try quart samples. Platinum Plus and Forever Paint both come in 8-ounce sizes. All are available for purchase.
Ecos Paints sells tidy little jars of paint samples (2 ounces) in three-packs. Samples are free (rebated) if you purchase one or more gallons of paint. Paint chips are available for free.
Kelly Moore Paints will provide one free quart of sample paint if you order online. The order will not be fulfilled via the online request, though. You receive a coupon that you take to a Kelly Moore Paints store in participating areas.
PPG Paints provides large 8-inch by 8-inch color cards for free by request online. PPG is also part of the Samplize color sample card program.
Sherwin-Williams paint is sold at standalone Sherwin-Williams stores. Color To Go is the largest-sized paint sample available, producing around 75 square feet of coverage. Loose paint chips are available for free at Sherwin-Williams stores. Sherwin-Williams does not offer paint fans for free. Also, you can purchase large cards of Sherwin-Williams paint at Samplize.
Valspar paint is found at Lowe's Home Improvement stores and 8-ounce samples are available for purchase either in-store or online. Loose paint chips are available for free at Lowe's. Valspar does not offer paint fans for free.
Cardboard is too absorbent of a material and will not accurately show the color. Instead, use solid paint swatches, which are made on thick paper in the form of squares or rectangles representing paint colors. These come either loose or bound as palettes in graduated form.
Liquid paint samples allow you to use disposable foam brushes or rollers, or even real brushes, to apply sample paint to your walls. Create a coverage box with painter's tape and stay within that box as you apply the sample.
With 8-ounce paint samples, you have 1/16th of the volume of a gallon of paint. Since a gallon of paint typically covers 400 square feet, with an 8-ounce sample you can cover as much as 25 square feet. Read the instructions on the tester, as some paint samples only cover about 16 square feet.
For a one-wall application such as an accent wall, you will be able to create a 5-foot by 5-foot square of test paint. For entire rooms, it is beneficial to coat all four walls because of shifting natural light during the day and artificial light at night. This amounts to about 6 1/4 square feet of test paint per wall (each square would be 2 1/2 feet by 2 1/2 feet).
Imagining your room's intended paint color with an online paint visualizer is valuable and fun but a bit of the realism is lost. Paint colors on a screen look different from paint colors on a wall, however, this can be a useful tool if you want to get an idea of how a color will look in the space and if warmer or cooler shades are right for you.
