MS Paint Color Picker
The Color Picker copies a color from your canvas so you can reuse it exactly. Matching colors by eye rarely works, because two shades of blue can look identical on screen and still differ in value. The picker removes the guesswork with a single click.
What the Color Picker Does
Picture a paint store with a wall of color sample cards. You hold a card against your wall, and the store mixes a perfect match. The Color Picker plays the same role inside Paint. You point at a color, click, and Paint loads that exact shade into your drawing tools.
The tool appears as an eyedropper icon in the Tools section of the toolbar.
How to Use the Color Picker
- Click the eyedropper icon in the Tools section.
- Move the pointer over the color you want to copy.
- Left-click to send the color to Color 1, or right-click to send it to Color 2.
- Select a drawing tool and start painting with the copied color.
The picker works only on the Paint canvas. It cannot grab colors from other windows or from the desktop.
Pick Colors from Other Programs
Press Windows, Shift, and S together to capture part of the screen. Switch to Paint and press Ctrl and V to paste the capture. The pasted image now sits on your canvas, and the picker can sample any color inside it.
Practical Uses
- Match a skin tone or sky color when you touch up a photo.
- Copy a brand color from a logo and reuse it in a poster.
- Keep every shape in a drawing at the same shade.
- Repair a scratched area by sampling the color next to it.
Reading Color Values
Every color has a numeric recipe. Paint mixes red, green, and blue light, and each of the three parts runs from 0 to 255. Pure red uses 255, 0, and 0. White uses 255 for all three parts. Black uses zero for all three.
A hex code writes the same recipe in six characters. Pure red becomes #FF0000. Open the Edit colors window after you pick a color to read its RGB numbers or its hex code. Copy those numbers into a notebook when you need the same shade tomorrow.
Picking from Photos
Photos hold millions of slightly different shades. A patch of sky may contain dozens of blues. Zoom in with the Magnifier or the zoom slider until single pixels become large squares. Pick from the middle of a solid area to get a clean, typical color.
Common Mistakes
Picking an Edge Pixel
Pixels along an edge blend two colors, so the picker returns a muddy mix. Move the pointer toward the center of the shape and click again.
Forgetting Which Slot Received the Color
Left-click fills Color 1 and right-click fills Color 2. Check the two color boxes after each pick. Drawing with the wrong slot produces a surprise color.
Expecting a Perfect Match from a Compressed Photo
JPEG files squeeze colors and add tiny variations. Two spots that look identical may differ by a few values. Pick once, then reuse that single pick across the whole drawing.