Skull Coloring Pages
50 free printable pages, ready to download and print.
Fifty skull and sugar skull coloring pages, from simple calavera faces for children to detailed Day of the Dead designs and plain bone skulls for adults.
Create a Custom Coloring Page
Describe what you'd like and we'll generate it free, no account needed
Family-friendly only · 1 free per day
The sugar skull is a genuinely unusual subject: a skull that is not frightening. Calaveras are decorated with marigolds, sugar, ribbon and bright paint precisely because Dia de los Muertos treats remembrance as a celebration rather than a mourning. That is why these designs carry so much ornament, and why they make such good coloring pages. This collection holds 50 skull and sugar skull coloring pages. Every design downloads free as a high resolution printable image, with no sign-up and no account.
The range runs wider than it used to. There are big bold calavera faces a five year old can finish in ten minutes, dense pattern pieces that will take an adult an hour, and plain anatomical skulls for anyone who wants to study the shape rather than decorate it. Pick by how much time you have rather than by age.
What Is in the Collection
Simple sugar skull faces. Start here if you are coloring with a young child. Simple Sugar Skull, Smiling Cartoon Sugar Skull, Sugar Skull With a Heart on Its Forehead and Two Sugar Skulls Side by Side all use thick outlines and large open shapes. Sugar Skull Wearing a Crown, Sugar Skull Ringed by Sunflower Petals, Sugar Skull Wearing a Wide Sombrero and Sugar Skull Between Two Maracas add one prop each without crowding the face.
Sweets and party pieces. Calaveras de azucar are food before they are art. Sugar Skull Cookie on a Plate, Sugar Skull Cupcake, Sugar Skull Lollipop and Candy-Decorated Sugar Skull all play on that. Sugar Skull Balloon, Sugar Skull Pinata and the cut-paper Papel Picado Sugar Skull Panel cover the decorations that go up around them.
Animal calaveras. Sugar Skull Cat, Sugar Skull Dog and Sugar Skull Owl give the treatment to a familiar face, which is the easiest way into the imagery for a child who finds a human skull uncomfortable. Sugar Skull With Bat Wings and Sugar Skull With Large Butterfly Wings put a pair of wings behind one instead.
Day of the Dead scenes. Day of the Dead Altar With a Sugar Skull and Marigolds draws a full ofrenda, the altar families build at home, and Sugar Skull With a Lit Candle on Top carries the candle that stands on one. Calavera Bride and Groom, Elegant Calavera Woman Portrait, Day of the Dead Skull Surrounded by Marigold Flowers and Mexican Folk Art Style Sugar Skull With Birds stay closest to the tradition.
Ornament and pattern. This is the heart of the collection for adult colorists. Decorative Sugar Skull Face With Floral Patterns, Ornate Sugar Skull Covered in Roses and Swirling Vines, Baroque Style Sugar Skull With Filigree Scrollwork and Sugar Skull With Swirling Paisley Patterns are the densest sheets here. Mosaic Tile Patterned Sugar Skull, Sugar Skull Centered Inside a Detailed Mandala, Repeating Decorative Pattern of Sugar Skulls and Flowers, Geometric Angular Skull With Diamond Shapes and Skull With a Celtic Knotwork Band break the design into cells you can color one at a time. Skull Wearing an Elaborate Flower Crown and Skull Surrounded by Blooming Roses and Ivy pair the skull with living growth.
Darker and Halloween leaning. Sugar Skull With a Spider and Web, Skull With Moths and Stars, Skull Overgrown With Mushrooms and Ivy and Skull With a Coiled Snake sit between the two holidays. Skull With a Rose Between Its Teeth, Dapper Skull Wearing a Top Hat and Monocle, Pirate Skull With an Eye Patch and Skull and Crossbones are the tattoo flash end of it.
Bone, drawn plain. For anyone who wants anatomy rather than decoration: Human Skull Front View, Human Skull Side View, Deer Skull With Large Antlers, Ram Skull With Curled Horns and Longhorn Cow Skull With Desert Flowers.
Who These Pages Are For
The collection splits in two. Roughly twenty sheets are drawn simply, with thick lines and few interior details, and those work for children of five and up. The rest carry fine linework and exacting symmetry, and most of those take an adult 45 to 90 minutes. Each page says which it is in its own description, so check before printing a stack for a class.
Colorists who enjoy tattoo flash, folk art or Baroque ornament find the most to work with in the pattern sheets. Anyone teaching a Dia de los Muertos unit will want the altar, the calavera couple and the papel picado panel, which carry the most of the holiday's actual content. The late October window is when these get used, since the holiday falls on 1 and 2 November.
Printing and Coloring Tips
Color symmetrically and the design will look finished even if you never touch the background. Sugar skulls are built on a mirror line down the middle of the face, so whatever you do to the left eye socket, repeat exactly on the right.
Use the traditional palette for an authentic result: marigold orange, magenta, turquoise, purple and lime green, kept bright and unblended. Calaveras are painted, not shaded, so flat saturated color is more accurate than careful gradients.
Print on 65 lb cardstock. These pages invite markers and gel pens, and the metallic and white gel pen accents that make sugar skull artwork sing need a paper that will not buckle underneath them.
More line art in the same spirit: Halloween, Zen and Spiritual and Henna Patterns.
Frequently Asked Questions
What do sugar skulls represent?
Calaveras are made for Dia de los Muertos, the Mexican observance held on 1 and 2 November, when families welcome back the spirits of relatives who have died. The skulls are decorated brightly and often carry a name on the forehead, because the holiday is a reunion rather than a mourning. They are meant to be joyful, which is why the traditional decoration is flowers, sugar and color rather than anything grim.
What colors are traditional for a sugar skull?
Marigold orange first, since the cempasuchil marigold is the flower of the holiday and is used to guide spirits home. Then magenta, turquoise, purple, lime green and yellow, all kept high in saturation. Real sugar skulls are decorated with colored icing and foil, so bright flat color is more faithful than realistic shading.
Are these sugar skull pages suitable for children?
About twenty of the fifty are, yes. The simple faces, the animal calaveras and the sweets all use thick outlines and large open shapes, and a child of five or six can finish one. The pattern sheets are a different matter and will frustrate most children under 10. None of the imagery is frightening, which is the point of a calavera, so the only thing to check is the line weight.
What is the difference between a sugar skull and a Halloween skull?
A sugar skull is a celebratory object from Dia de los Muertos, decorated with flowers, scrollwork and bright color, and traditionally named for a specific deceased person. A Halloween skull draws on a different tradition entirely and is usually drawn to unsettle. Most of this collection sits in the first category, though a handful of the plainer bone sheets will serve either holiday.
Which page should I start with?
If you are coloring with a child, print the simple sugar skull or the cartoon one. If you want something absorbing for yourself, the paisley sheet and the papel picado panel hold the most detail. If you are after something to frame, the calavera couple and the ofrenda altar are the two that read as pictures rather than motifs.
How do I print these pages?
Open any page in the collection and use the download button to save the high resolution image, then print it at whatever size you like. Nothing is gated, there is no account to create, and the files are free.
Part of our Halloween collection
This set is one of 9 Halloween themes. The Halloween hub lists every one of them in a single place.
See all Halloween coloring pages →