What Comes in a Paint by Numbers Kit

A paint by numbers listing shows you the picture. It almost never shows you the box.

Most kits hold the same four things, so the photo tells you very little about how the painting will actually go. Whether your first evening is calm or irritating comes down to the detail of those four things.

Here is what comes in a kit, what each part does, and what you still need from your own cupboard.

What is in the box

Open one of our kits and you find four things.

• A canvas printed with numbered shapes, already tinted in soft color
• A small numbered pot for every color in the design
• Six brushes, from a wide flat one down to a fine liner
• A printed reference picture of the finished painting

That is the whole kit. There is nothing to glue and nothing to mix, and no drawing at any point. You match a number on the canvas to the same number on a pot and fill the shape in.

The quality of those four parts is what you are paying for, and it varies a lot between shops.

The canvas

The canvas is real cotton with a visible weave. Some kits use a thin printed sheet closer to card, and the difference matters more than it sounds. That kind of sheet creases in the mail and drinks paint unevenly, and it never quite sits flat on a wall afterwards.

Printed on it are the outlines of every shape in the design, each one carrying a number. Small shapes sit where the detail is, big open shapes where the sky or the background is.

Ours come in two sizes. Classic is 12 by 16 inches and Large is 16 by 20 inches. You also choose framed or unframed. Framed arrives stretched over a wooden frame and ready to hang. Unframed arrives rolled in a tube, which you flatten before you start.

Why a pre-colored canvas is easier to follow

Most listings skip past this, and it changes how the whole kit feels.

On a plain white canvas, every shape is white with a faint number inside it. Gray print on white has almost no contrast, so you squint. Worse, if a shape gets thin paint or gets missed entirely, the white glares through and you can see it from the other side of the room.

On a pre-colored canvas, each shape is already printed in a light version of the color it will become. The sky area is faint blue. Leaves are faint green. The numbers still read clearly, and a sliver your brush missed is already close to the right color, so nobody notices it.

Our canvases are printed this way. If you are comparing kits elsewhere, zoom into an unpainted corner of the product photos. Bright white tells you what you are getting.

The paint

Every color gets its own pot, and every pot has its number printed on it. That sounds too basic to mention until you own a kit where the numbers are on the tray instead. Lift a pot out and you are holding two near identical greys and guessing.

The paint is acrylic. It washes out of brushes with plain water while it is wet, and it dries opaque, which is why nearly every mistake in paint by numbers is fixable.

Acrylic settles in the pot, so give one a gentle stir with the handle end of a brush before you start on it.

What one-coat paint changes

Paint is where a cheap kit cuts first, and it costs you the most time.

Thin acrylic goes on, dries, and you can still read the number through it. So you paint it again. A section that should have taken ten minutes takes half an hour, and the surface ends up bumpy where you kept going over it.

Paint that covers in one pass needs a single stroke before you move on. Our paints are made to cover in one coat, and that one difference is most of what people mean when they say a kit felt relaxing.

The six brushes

Some kits hand you one brush for an entire canvas, which fails at both ends. A wide brush will not fit a thin shape. A tiny brush takes all night on an open sky.

Every kit we sell has six, and they cover the range without you having to think about it.

• The wide flat brushes are for skies, water, walls and backgrounds
• The medium ones do most of the work on a normal canvas
• The fine liner is for eyes, petal edges, whiskers and the slivers between two shapes

Brushes last for years if you rinse them as soon as you finish a color. What ruins them is being left to dry with paint in the bristles.

The reference picture

The printed reference shows the finished design with every number marked, at full size. You will use it more than you expect.

It answers the two questions that come up on every canvas. Which number was that shape, now that paint has covered the printing? And is this patch meant to be in shadow or in light?

Prop it where you can glance at it without moving the canvas.

What you need to supply yourself

None of this is special equipment. It is all in the kitchen already.

• Water in two cups, one to rinse brushes in and a second you keep clean
• A few sheets of paper towel
• A saucer or a scrap of card to rest brushes on
• A bright lamp, which matters more than people expect
• Something to protect the table

The lamp is the one worth fussing over. This is close work, and good light keeps the numbers readable so you are not squinting after twenty minutes. Sit with the light coming over your shoulder onto the canvas rather than into your eyes.

What to check when your kit arrives

Five minutes now saves an interrupted evening later.

• Count the pots against the highest number you can see on the canvas
• Open one pot and stir it, so you know the paint is loose and usable
• Check the reference sheet is in the box and readable
• If the canvas came rolled, lay it face up under a few heavy books overnight

If anything is missing or damaged, sort it out before you start rather than halfway through. Our refund policy page covers how that works.

What is not in the box

Worth knowing before you order, so nothing surprises you.

• No easel. Most people paint flat on a table, which is steadier anyway
• No varnish. A finished canvas does not need it, though a clear acrylic varnish from a craft shop evens out the sheen
• No frame on the rolled option. Choose framed at checkout for that
• No spare paint. There is a pot for every color, with enough in it for normal single coats

Picking which kit to open first

The contents are the same across every design we sell. The design itself decides how the painting feels, far more than your skill does.

Big open shapes and a clear split between light and dark are kind to a first canvas. Our beginner collection is sorted on exactly that. If you would rather browse by what catches your eye, the full catalog runs to more than 850 designs, and the best sellers are a reasonable short list. Or send us a photo you already love and we will build it into a custom kit with its own numbered canvas and matched pots.

If this is your first one, our guide to starting and finishing a first canvas picks up where this article stops.

Questions people ask about what is in the box

Do I need to buy paint separately?

No. Every color in the design has its own numbered pot in the box. You do not mix anything and you do not match colors by eye.

Is there enough paint to finish the canvas?

Yes, for a canvas painted in normal single coats. Go back over the same area three or four times and you can run a pot low, which is one more reason not to rework a patch that is already drying.

Does the kit come with a frame?

Only if you choose the framed option, which arrives stretched over a wooden frame and ready to hang. Unframed arrives rolled in a tube and you flatten it yourself.

Are six brushes enough for one canvas?

Yes. Six covers wide areas, normal shapes and fine detail. Rinse them between colors and the same set will see you through several paintings.

Can I get a kit made from my own photo?

Yes. A custom kit holds the same contents as any other, with the canvas printed from your photograph instead of one of our designs.

How soon will it arrive?

Our kits ship in six to ten business days, which is worth allowing for when it is a gift.