The Best Nude Lip Liner for Your Skin Tone

In our humble opinion, lip liner doesn’t get its fair share of glory. Even with the popularity of plumped-up lips at an all-time high (thanks to certain celebrities and socialites), it seems like we’re still underestimating the power of lip liner to help enlarge the appearance of our pouts. Sure, there’s plenty of other lip makeup to go around, from glosses to balms to lipstick, but good ol’ lip liner can also help enhance the look of all your other lip makeup. However, when done wrong—which includes using the wrong hue for your skin tone—it’s also true that lip liner can look totally unnatural. To avoid this issue, while also keeping up with one of the most popular makeup trends of the moment (nude hues), why not try out a nude lip liner look? Here, we’re sharing the best nude lip liners for your skin tone—but before we get to that, find out more about why you need to add a nude lip liner to your makeup bag in the first place.

WHY SHOULD YOU TRY LIP LINER?

We think lip liner is a necessary product in everyone’s makeup arsenal and here’s why:

1. It can help fill-out and define your pout

We’ve already touched on this, but using lip liner can work wonders in helping to add the look of volume and dimension to your lips. And let’s be honest, after scrolling through your Instagram feed, wouldn’t you be lying if you said you weren’t curious about experimenting with the look of a plumper pout? Well, anyone can easily use lip liner to help give off the appearance of larger lips. Don’t want bigger-looking lips? You can use lip liner to simply define your natural shape and size, too.

2. It can help enhance your lip’s natural color

Chances are, you don’t wear a bright, bold red lip every day of the week. Sticking with a nude shade that’s similar to your natural lip color, then lightly tracing the outline of your lips with a liner in the same shade, is a quick and easy way to enhance your natural color without going overboard.

THE BEST NUDE LIP LINERS FOR EVERY SKIN TONE

There’s a nude lip liner out there for everyone. Read on for our best matches for light, medium, and dark skin tones—and don’t forget to take your undertones into consideration when making your pick.

THE BEST NUDE LIP LINERS FOR LIGHT SKIN TONES

Go nude with one of the following options:

If you have medium skin with warm undertones…try the L'Oréal Paris Colour Riche Lip Liner in Au Naturale.

If you have light skin with cool undertones…try the L'Oréal Paris Colour Riche Lip Liner in Eternal Mauve.

THE BEST NUDE LIP LINERS FOR MEDIUM SKIN TONES

When your skin tone is somewhere in between light and dark, these are the best nudes for you:

If you have medium skin with warm undertones…try the L'Oréal Paris Colour Riche Matte Lip Liner in Matte-ing Call.

If you have medium skin with cool undertones…try the L'Oréal Paris Colour Riche Matte Lip Liner in Matte-stermind.

THE BEST NUDE LIP LINERS FOR DARK SKIN TONES

Dark skin tones look amazing with nude lip colors—try one of the following options to see for yourself:

If you have dark skin with warm undertones…try the L'Oréal Paris Colour Riche Matte Lip Liner in Matte’s It.

If you have dark skin with cool undertones…try the L'Oréal Paris Colour Riche Lip Liner in Nudes For Life.

HOW TO MATCH YOUR NUDE LIP LINER TO A LIPSTICK

Once you have your nude lip liner, we’re banking on the fact that you’ll want to layer nude lipstick on top. We recommend choosing a color that coordinates with your liner as closely as possible. Despite what you may have heard, it isn’t necessary to wear a lip liner that’s lighter or darker than your lipstick—in fact, that can be one of the culprits of an unnatural lip look.

Next up: Need a refresher on how best to apply these liners? Here’s How to Use Lip Liner and 10 Lip Liner Hacks That Will Make Applying Lipstick Easier.