Dying Easter eggs with food coloring is easy and makes bright beautiful eggs. No need to run out and get an expensive store-bought egg-dying kit! With a few ingredients, most of them already in your kitchen, you probably have all you need for coloring Easter eggs.

For more decorating ideas beyond the dye, check out this post on creative ways to decorate Easter eggs.  Don’t forget to EGG your neighbor. Your kids will love this activity! They might also like these free Easter coloring pages.

Dying Easter eggs; colored eggs, glasses filled with food coloring
brightly colored eggs

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Dying Easter eggs is one of my family’s favorite spring events that’s why I am excited to share with you how we do it. What’s best is you can make them as vibrant of color from the dye baths as you like. Oh, the brilliant colors you will see!

Supplies for Dying Eggs with food coloring

  • Water
  • Food Coloring
  • White Vinegar
  • Hard Boiled Eggs (learn how to make the perfect hard boiled eggs with these tips)
  • Bowls or large cups
  • Whisk (optional; affiliate link)
  • Paper towels

how to dye eggs with food coloring supplies dye whisk eggs vinegar

How to dye eggs with food coloring step-by-step

  1. Place 1/2 cup hot tap water in containers – these can be bowls or cups that are deep enough to completely submerge an egg.
  2. Place 20 drops of food coloring per 1/2 cup water (I used 40 drops and 1 cup to accommodate the size of my glasses).
  3. Mix well.
  4. Add in 1 tablespoon white vinegar and stir.
  5. To create new colors follow the guide on the back of the box. Most liquid food coloring boxes found at the grocery store will have a handy color mixing guide on the back of the box.

Tips for dying easter eggs

  • Warning: food coloring is safe but will stain clothing or tabletops. You should have paper towels handy and you may want to protect surfaces with old newspaper or a drop-cloth.
  • The longer you leave the eggs in the food coloring mixture, the brighter the eggs. Start with a few minutes and then go from there. A great experiment for kids!
  • You can dye brown eggs! They come out looking very pretty, sometimes a little darker and more naturally speckled than the white eggs.
  • Boiled eggs can be dyed warm or cold. We prefer to let them cool for safety.
  • A whisk is super handy for dipping the eggs.
dye in glasses for dying Easter eggs

Dying Easter Eggs Trick

Have you ever tried putting your eggs inside a whisk? This simple idea makes egg coloring a lot easier for kids and toddlers! Egg stays put and is easy to retrieve!

dying easter eggs - whisk with white egg in it about to be dipped in yellow  food dye

Just place the egg inside the whisk and dip it inside the desired color. No more mess! Also, to prevent stains, you might have children wear old clothes or protective clothing and cover the table. If the weather is nice, we have a lot of success dying eggs outside.

dying easter eggs - whisk with egg in it dipped in red food coloring

Can I use regular food coloring for dyed Easter eggs?

Can you use plain old food coloring and get a vibrant color? Yes, the regular food coloring in the baking aisle is the kind of dye we use for our Easter eggs! My daughter especially loves the neon food coloring.

Some people mix the dye into boiling water or very hot water. Feel free to try that if you don’t have small children, but for us the trick is really leaving the eggs in the solution long enough, at least 15 minutes for saturated colors.

Dying eggs with gel food coloring

Get especially vivid results from the gel paste dyes you can find at craft stores. You might find them in the store near baking pans, rather than in the baking and spices aisle.

Learn how to dye hollow shells after blowing out the eggs! This is a great alternative for decorative egg displays you want to keep longer, or when your family just isn’t that crazy about boiled eggs.

The gel food coloring is great because you only need a small amount for a really saturated color. You can get a similar effect with regular food coloring, with the drops-to-water ratio listed above.

Can you dye eggs without vinegar?

What if you get everything ready, and you find you’re all out of white vinegar? The purpose of adding vinegar to the water and dye is to help the dye bond to the eggshell. Without it, you can still dye eggs, but the color won’t be as vibrant.

Instead of vinegar, you can substitute lemon or lime juice in the same proportions as listed above. You can also use vitamin C powder or crush up a vitamin C tablet and stir it into the water and dye solution.

Tie-dye Easter eggs

There are so many ways to decorate Easter eggs with just a few supplies! How about some groovy tie-dyed eggs?

To create a tie-dye effect, try dripping food coloring on a paper towel, then spraying with your water and vinegar solution until it starts to spread. Then just wrap the paper towel around a boiled egg, secure with some rubber bands, and let it sit for about a minute.

Now unwrap and check out all the cool colors. This is a kid-favorite way of dying Easter eggs. Far out!

MORE HOW TO COLOR Easter eggs IDEAS

Here are some other fun decorating Easter egg ideas.

Shaving Cream Eggs

Dying Easter eggs with shaving cream and food coloring is a unique way to decorate eggs. No single egg looks like another!

decorating easter eggs - shaving cream dyed eggs

Glitter Eggs

These glitter eggs make a great Easter decorating idea. They are so cute!

decorating Easter eggs - three glitter decorated eggs in a straw basket with fake green grass; there is a pink polka-dot egg, orange striped egg, and green wiggly stripped egg

Dying Eggs with Silk Ties

Silk tie eggs are an amazing way to create dyed Easter eggs by recycling old ties. The process is so easy and the results are gorgeous! 

decorating easter egg - silk tie dyed eggs

CHALKBOARD PAINTED EGGS

Kids love coloring their chalkboard-painted eggs (over and over). You can also try drawing on the eggs with crayons before dipping. It’s such a fun way of decorating Easter eggs.

decorating easter eggs - blue chalkboard painted egg with the name Katie written on it with two flowers; the egg is setting on a bron straw basket with fake green grass like a nest

I hope you enjoy coloring your eggs with food coloring. As shared above, food coloring eggs is just one way to decorate Easter eggs. If you are adventurous have fun and try one of my other techniques. Happy Easter!

more fun projects to try

I would love to keep you fully stocked with creative ideas, yummy recipes, fun crafts, and loads of free printables. Subscribe to Skip to my Lou to get new ideas delivered to your inbox. Follow me on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, and Instagram for all my latest updates.


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Comments

  1. Do you dye the eggs in hot water, or do you let the water cool? I just worried about having a boiled egg sitting in hot water for 15 minutes (boiled-cooled-hot water–cool–eat????)

  2. I love the idea about using a whisk to handle the eggs. Large spoons are what I always used. Always went to church on Easter Sunday with stained fingers. LOL.

  3. Justin, typically I use the liquid food coloring but I have also used the gel kind too. You might need to let the eggs sit in the coloring longer.

  4. Netta I remember doing this as a child. We would use a white crayon to make designs and then the dye wouldn’t stick in those areas. It is like batik for eggs. So fun! Thanks for reminding me.

  5. Great idea using a whisk. Curious if this food colouring dye works for the crafting eggs I bought at Michaels. They don’t take the typical egg dying kits well.

  6. Thanks for the tip about using food coloring, so next year as we already bought & used the egg kit last night, LOL

  7. Hi Yavon,

    I move two of the whisk wires apart and let the egg roll gently out onto a paper towel. Hope this helps.

  8. Thanks for the tips. I will definitely try the putting your eggs inside a whisk idea. I never thought of that. Very creative. Perfect for this Easter Sunday.

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