A real rainbow never improvises. Red on the outside, violet tucked inside, the same seven bands in the same order every single time. Sunlight, a few million water droplets, and one fixed law of physics settle the question before anyone picks up a crayon.
A rainbow on paper answers to nobody. Purple on top, red in the middle, a green stripe where the blue used to be. On a coloring page your child holds the only authority that counts, and the result is still, completely, a rainbow.
That small gap between the sky's rules and the page's freedom is the whole reason rainbows are such a good thing to color.
Two ways to color a rainbow
There is no wrong answer here, only two directions. One follows the real sky. The other follows your kid. Both end with a full spread of color and a page worth taping to the fridge.
| Way to color | The colors | It matches | Great for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Color it like the sky | Red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet, outer edge inward | A rainbow you can spot outside | A quiet lesson in light and a "find the real one" game after rain |
| Color it like you | Any color, any band, any order | Whatever mood your kid woke up in | A cheerful bit of rule breaking, like a purple sky over a golden hill |
If your child wants the true version, the order is easy to hold onto once you meet Roy G. Biv. Each letter starts the name of a color, outer band to inner: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet. Red rides the outside of the arc, violet curves along the inside, and the rest line up between them.
And if your child wants a turquoise rainbow over a pink hill, that is the right answer too. The pages here work both ways.
Coloring fun for kids — anywhere.
Free for iOS & Android. No ads, no sign-up, offline-ready.
Coloring fun for kids — anywhere.
Free coloring app for kids. iOS and Android, phones and tablets. No ads, no sign-up, even offline.
Rainbows worth knowing
A few facts are worth slipping in while the crayons are out. They turn a quiet coloring session into a small science lesson, and they give older kids something to draw on purpose.
The second arc runs backwards. When a fainter rainbow appears above the main one, its colors flip: red on the inside, violet on the outside. The light bounces twice inside each droplet to make that second bow, which is why it looks dimmer and reversed.
A rainbow is sunlight pulled apart. Hold a glass of water in a sunbeam, or watch a soap bubble drift past, and the same colors show up. White light is every color traveling together until something bends it into a fan.
Rainbows hide in small places. A garden sprinkler, a puddle touched with oil, the mist at the foot of a waterfall. Once a child knows what makes a rainbow, they start finding them everywhere.
Rainbows and rain clouds travel together, so a bright arc pairs nicely with a sheet of cloud coloring pages for the sky behind it.
What else could you color?
Pick a prompt or type your own — opens in a new tab.
Print your rainbow
Pick a page, then pick your rules. Color it like the sky for the lesson, color it like you for the fun, or print two and do both. Crayons ready, here is the full set.
