Top half brown bottom half blonde hair

Sometimes it seems like your hair stylist is speaking a foreign language. Balayage. Ombré. Sombré. Foilayage. Translation please! Here’s how to understand the difference between ombré, balayage and everything in-between, and how to figure out the best hair color solution for you!

Ombré: The Striking Hair Color Solution

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Hair Color Credit: @constancerobbins

What is ombré?

In French, ombré means “shade” or “shadow.” In the hair color world, ombré is a dramatic, two-toned hair color effect that is typically darker at the top and lighter on the bottom. Often the dark, top section is your natural hair color shade and the bottom section is lightened with hair lightener. An ombré hairstyle can also be any color combination—natural blonde, brown or red, or something unconventional like pink, blue, green or purple. It’s versatile, customizable and suitable for most long and medium hair lengths. A big plus with ombré hair color is that it’s easy on the budget. You don’t have to touch it up very often since the top section remains dark. The overall look of ombré hair color can change as your hair grows out, which many clients enjoy!

The different types of ombré:

A subtler version of ombré is called sombré. In a sombré hairstyle, the contrast between the two tones is softer. Another variation is called color melting. In color melting, two or three hair color shades may be used on each strand, and each shade is blended with the side of the hair color brush so that they appear to melt into each other. Like ombré, color melting can be done with natural-looking hair color shades or with any of the fun colors of the rainbow!

Is ombré for you?

If you like to make a statement with your hair, if you’re creative and adventurous with your personal style, go for it! Just be sure your hair is healthy to begin with, otherwise your hair color will look dull and will fade quickly. If necessary, spend some time using healthy, healing conditioning treatments and hair masks to improve the condition of your hair before heading to the salon for your ombré hair color!

Balayage: The Subtle Hair Color Solution

Hair Color Credit: @constancerobbins

What is balayage?

In French, balayage means “sweeping.” In the hair color world, balayage highlights are hand-painted or swept along the surface of the hair. The application begins away from the roots and gradually becomes heavier as it travels along the section, culminating in the heaviest application of lightener or hair color at the ends. Because the hair color or lightener is concentrated on the surface of each section, the underside remains darker, which gives the hair a very natural, dimensional effect. The resulting subtle balayage hairstyle mimics a natural, sun-kissed effect that has been in high demand from celebrities, models and high profile “it” girls for some time now. Balayage can be done on any hair color, from blonde hair to red hair to brown hair, although it’s typically not the first choice for super dark brunettes. It’s beautiful on long hair and on medium-length hair. Like ombré, balayage highlights are cost-effective because they don’t require frequent touchups, since the hair at the top is kept darker.

The different types of balayage:

Because balayage is a hand-painting technique, the artistry of your hair stylist comes into play and allows for many variations and beautiful color compositions. Hair color artists might combine several shades, for example, for a shimmering, dimensional result. If your hair is dark, they may opt for a foilayage technique. In foilayage, instead of allowing the balayage highlights to process in the air after they’re applied, they’re wrapped in foil, which provides more heat, and therefore amplifies the lightening process. Balayage may also be combined with conventional highlights placed closer to the face, or with fine, baby-lights placed around the face and hairline for a complexion-boosting glow.

Is balayage for you?

If you love sexy, natural-looking hair color (and who doesn’t?) balayage is a beautiful choice! Balayage hair color will bring nearly every hairstyle to life!

Just because you have naturally blonde or brunette hair doesn't mean that you can't ever dip your toes—er, strands—into the opposite side of the hair color spectrum. That's what we call getting the best of both worlds. For brunettes, it's incredibly easy to lighten up your overall look and embrace a more multi-dimensional mane by adding a few strokes of golden blonde here, a couple drizzles of honey there.

There's almost never a bad time to add some fresh, bright blonde onto a brunette base, no matter the season or reason. Whether you're drawn to wonderfully blended looks like tortoiseshell brown, subtle tweaks like a caramel blonde color melt, or unexpected shades like smoky ash bronde, there is a gorgeous new hue just waiting to be taken to the salon. Here are 40 brown hair ideas with blonde highlights to find inspiration.

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Blended Balayage

Get the most bang for your buck by focusing largely on the ends and incorporating a whole scheme of hair colors, from chocolate brown to caramel to honey blonde. This stunning blend is loaded with personality.

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Dark Brown Hair with Caramel Blonde Highlights

These roots are super dark, contrasting with bold and striking caramel blonde balayage around the face and towards the ends. The strongest highlights will call attention to your beaming face.

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Chocolate Brown Hair with Beige Blonde Highlights

The goal of this look is to make everything mold together seamlessly for a rich finished color. The pure chocolate brown is matched with a neutral beige blonde for a unified palette.

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Short Brown Hair with Blonde Highlights

This cool-toned brown bob got some cool-toned blonde to match, making it a perfect sandy color. Lighter shades on the top tresses give the impression of hours spent basking in the sun.

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Tortoiseshell Brown Hair with Honey Blonde Highlights

Tortoiseshell hair—the blend of chocolate brown, chestnut, caramel, and honey—is one of the trendiest hair colors for brunettes ever. Adding a little extra honey blonde in the look makes for an even more statement-making style.

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Cool-Blonde Balayage

If your hair is already blessed with a cool brown base, invest in a few key pieces of icy blonde around the face to lighten things up with little-to-no maintenance needed.

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Platinum Blonde Money Piece

If you're interested in giving dark brown hair a zing of very light blonde, less is more. Enhance the face-framing pieces with platinum blonde, and blend the color around the face. Solid brown gets instant style.

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Ash Brown Hair with Golden Blonde Ombré

We never thought such a pretty waterfall of color was possible before setting our eyes on this wavy mane. Starting with a medium cool brown and ending in a perfect buttery blonde, these tresses almost drip with gold.

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Sparkling Mocha

For the subtlest kick of color that still feels like a statement, request blended baby balayage throughout in a warm golden shade. The highlights add a gleam of brightness to a mocha hair color.

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Toffee Blonde Babylights

Give your complexion an almost metallic golden glow with complementary caramel babylights on warm brown hair. Then brush out and smooth the hair for extra shine.

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Ashy Brown Hair with Icy Blonde Highlights

The cool blue-gray tones in this ashy brown hair look even more eye-catching with fine icy blonde highlights throughout the layers.

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Dark Brown Hair with Face-Framing Blonde

This ashy dark-as-coal brown takes well to bold face-framing touches of golden blonde. Caramel tones are added throughout to bridge the gap between these two striking colors.

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Warm Bronze

If you're stuck between wanting more blonde and more red in your hair tone, choose a tawny toffee blonde and go heavy on the balayage. Hints of bronze add subtle personality to the blend.

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Iced Mocha

For a super low-maintenance approach, ask to focus around the face on those flattering "money pieces," with subtle touches of balayage throughout to tie it all together. It's a style you'll be sure not to grow out of.

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Ashy Brown Hair with Honey Blonde Highlights

Ashy brown locks lean towards cool tones, such as silver, rather than warm tones, such as the reds and golds in chestnut browns. This ashy light brown gets a touch of warmth with honey highlights to create a cohesively cool style.

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Brown Hair with Platinum Babylights

Adding super subtle platinum highlights adds intense dimension to dark chocolate brown hair. Tread lightly, as highlights this much lighter than the base color can go too far if done heavily.

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Tortoiseshell Melt

We won't ever get over how absolutely dreamy this multi-dimensional color is, especially how it melts from dark brown all the way to golden honey. The addition of bold highlights adds even more complexity and drama to this look.

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Warm Blonde Melt

Choose golden, honey, and caramel tones to create a color melt from chocolate brown roots. It's guaranteed to light up the whole look.

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Ash Brown Lob with Cool Blonde Balayage

It's easy to underestimate the cool factor behind ashy tones, but don't be afraid to be a little late to the party. This very dark ashy brown shade works well in tandem with beigy blondes for a multi-dimensional look.

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Sandy Brown Crop with Blonde Highlights

We love a crop with long side-swept bangs. This edgy style has the perfect balance of a light brown base that's amplified with highlights and lowlights.

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Strawberry Blonde-Tinged Curls

Brown curls can get an easy update with subtle blonde balayage that focuses on the ends. It makes ringlets and spirals glow a little extra.

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Ice Blonde Balayage

Darker cool-toned brunettes can keep with the flow of things by adding balayage in other cool tones like ice blonde. Keep the roots dark, and blend down seamlessly.

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Heavy Golden Blonde Balayage Highlights

If you're naturally brunette but want to be blonde, this is a great option to keep things low-maintenance. Ask for robust hair color from midway down to the ends in the blonde of your choice, but blending with the dark roots to minimize grow-out lines.

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Dark Brown Hair with Heavy Blonde Balayage

This dark brown mane makes a statement with platinum ombré ends, which will still grow out flatteringly and make touch-ups not as frequent.

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Chestnut Brown Hair with Face-Framing Blonde

This dark chocolate hair color gets a boost from face-framing golden highlights. Subtle chestnut highlights add extra warmth throughout.

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Curly Brown Hair with Blonde Highlights

Nothing revives some dark brown ringlets like golden blonde highlights. Curls are often approached with a free-hand technique, such as balayage, to give dimension without completely transforming your hair color.

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Chestnut Brown Hair with Soft Blonde Ombré

The sun-kissed lower half of this hairstyle makes it look silky smooth and buttery soft. The butterscotch tone of the blonde works with the warmer brown shade perfectly.

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Dark Brown Lob with Buttery Blonde Balayage

This playful style uses very determined touches of lighter blonde to really play up the dark chocolate brown color of the lob-length cut. The long layers in this wavy cut are certain to ripple on a breezy beach.

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Bronde Stacked Bob

Where does the brown start and blonde end? That's the point! This perfectly blended stacked bob is our answer for defining the term: bronde.

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Baby Caramel Melt

It's almost like you're transitioning to blonde—but without any of the upkeep or harsh grow-out. Keep a shadow root in your natural color and finish with a delicate melt of caramel blonde color.

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Light Brown Hair with Amber Blonde Highlights

We can't imagine a better pairing than this sweet cola brown and buttery honey blonde. They come together for a pretty cream soda finish.

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Dark Brown Hair with Blonde Highlights

This look injects some life into dark chocolate brown locks using thin, very subtle blonde highlights. The touches of blonde catch light in a way that a solid brown shade lacks.

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Chocolate Brown Hair with Caramel Blonde Balayage

These sweet-as-sugar, caramel-tinted honey blonde highlights are enough to make us book an appointment at our salon right now. Keep tantalizing pieces of the dark brown base to peek through.

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Light Brown Hair with Blonde Highlights

This light brown lob gets an icy touch with platinum blonde highlighting from roots to ends. Feathering calls attention to the subtle contrast between these well-suited shades.

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Medium Brown Hair with Buttery Blonde Highlights

This tousled mane of hair makes the most of its natural thickness. The stylist added a touch of golden highlights starting at the crown, working down to a brilliant blonde with artful balayage strokes.

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Sandy Brown Hair with Blonde Highlights

It's hard to go wrong with sandy brown hair, unless you're leaving it flat in color. Inject some personality into the beige tone with blonde highlights that complement the neutral natural color.

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Brown Hair with Copper Blonde Highlights

This cinnamon brown hair benefits from some copper and blonde highlighting, especially around the face. The highlights make the spicy brown base look that much yummier.

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Medium Brown Hair with Blonde Highlights

If you have neutral brown hair, honey-beige highlights are the way to stick with your tone and also lighten things up. This balayage was done with a heavy hand for added flair.

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Light Brown Hair with Natural Honey Highlights

This cohesive look uses a shade or two lighter than the base color with highlights that blend into the natural brown. Ask for smudged roots to make this style low-maintenance.

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Layered Brown Hair with Strawberry Blonde Balayage

This chunkier balayage starts closer to the dark brown roots, making quite the cherry-cola statement. Strawberry blonde highlights make the red in this blend pop.

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