Short answer
The long move towards neutrals is well documented in some places — US cars and photographs of everyday objects in one museum collection — and in cars it appears to have levelled off rather than reversed. 'Bright revivals' such as dopamine decor are real as named design movements but have no public market data behind them, and the colour-of-the-year announcements themselves have recently moved towards neutrals, not away from them.
Two independent sources measure a drift towards neutral. In US cars, white, black, grey and silver went from under half of 1996 model-year cars to about four in five of 2025 ones. In the Science Museum Group's analysis of photographs of thousands of everyday objects, grouped by date, the collection's objects became greyer over time — with the authors' caveat that a museum collection is not a random sample of everything made. These are different sectors measured by different methods, which makes their agreement more interesting than either alone. The fuller evidence, including interiors and consumer objects, is set out in the Colour Through Time section.
In cars, the strongest series, the neutral share has stayed close to 80% since the 2020 model year, and the analysts who produced it read that as the rise reaching its limit. The only non-neutral colour whose car share grew over thirty years was orange, to about 0.3%. That is a plateau with a thin fringe of colour, not a revival. Elsewhere there is no comparable public series, so claims that homes or products are 'getting colourful again' cannot currently be tested against counts.
Interiors magazines have promoted colour-maximalist styles under names such as 'dopamine decor', which one magazine says it first reported in 2022. The label is real and widely used by designers, and it describes genuine rooms. What it does not come with is a share figure: there is no public evidence of how many homes were painted brightly before and after. In this section's lifecycle terms, such a style can be recorded as emerging in design media with limited evidence, not as a revival of colour in the housing stock.
The colour-of-the-year announcements offer an unexpected test. Counting every single-colour announcement in the dataset, the share in a neutral family (white, grey, black, brown or a named neutral) was small in the 2000s and 2010s and has risen since 2020: Pantone chose its first brown for 2025 and its first white for 2026, Benjamin Moore chose browns for 2025 and 2026, Sherwin-Williams a khaki for 2026 and WGSN an earthy neutral for 2028. The forecasters, whose business is selling colour, are leaning neutral. That says nothing directly about the market, but it cuts against the idea that the industry is heralding a bright revival.
The neutral-share table on this page is computed from the dataset and changes as announcements are added.
| Period | Single-colour announcements | Neutral family | Neutral share |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2000–2009 | 16 | 1 | 6% |
| 2010–2019 | 35 | 5 | 14% |
| 2020 onwards | 37 | 8 | 22% |
Why: Striking examples are photographed and shared; ordinary neutral rooms are not.
Fix: Ask for a before-and-after share from the same source; without one, treat it as a style report.
Why: A levelling of the neutral share is mistaken for a fall.
Fix: Check whether the non-neutral share is growing, and by how much; in the US series it is not, beyond a fraction of a percent for orange.
Each statement is labelled by kind — established fact, a standard’s requirement, observed market data, a convention, or Colourwise’s own interpretation or analysis — with the strength of the evidence behind it.
Observed market dataStrong evidence· United States· Model years 1996–2025
White, black, grey and silver rose from 47.3% of 1996 model-year US cars to 80.4% of 2025 model-year cars and have stayed near 80% since the 2020 model year.
Measured: More than 22 million used cars resold January 2025 to May 2026.
Caveat: One country, one sector, resale data by model year.
FactModerate evidence
A computer-vision analysis of photographs of everyday objects in the Science Museum Group collection found the objects becoming greyer over time.
Caveat: The authors note the collection is not a random sample of objects made, and photographs are not calibrated colour measurements.
Source: Colour & Shape: Using Computer Vision to Explore the Science Museum Group Collection; A little greyer and a bit more rectangular?
FactLimited evidence
'Dopamine decor' is a named colour-maximalist interiors style that an interiors magazine says it first reported in 2022; no market share data for it was found.
Caveat: Evidence that the label exists and is used, not that bright interiors increased.
Source: Dopamine decor (feature on the colour-maximalist interiors trend)
Colourwise analysisModerate evidence
The share of single-colour colour-of-the-year announcements falling in a neutral family is higher from 2020 onwards than in either earlier decade in Colourwise's dataset.
Based on: Computed from the family field of every single-family announcement in the trends dataset, grouped by decade; 'neutral' covers white, grey, black, brown and named neutrals.
Caveat: The dataset has more authorities in later years, so the mix of announcers changes over time as well as their choices.
Source: Pantone introduces the Pantone Color of the Year 2026 (press release); Benjamin Moore announces Silhouette AF-655 as its Color of the Year 2026; Color of the Year archive; WGSN and Coloro announce the Colour of the Year for 2028
Reviewed 29 September 2026. Colourwise summarises its sources in its own words and does not reproduce standards text or proprietary colour data. Spotted an error? Tell us.