So you’re looking for the best paint sets for beginner miniature painters, specifically ones UK hobbyists actually recommend. You’ve got a box of models sitting on the table and absolutely no idea where to start with paint. Don’t worry, we’ve all been there.
The good news is you don’t need much. The bad news is that the hobby industry isn’t always great at telling you that. Walk into any hobby store or browse online and you’ll be met with dozens of brands, hundreds of colours, and about fifteen different types of paint you’ve apparently never heard of.
Here’s the thing though, for a complete beginner it really comes down to two brands. Citadel and Army Painter. That’s it. Everything else can wait.
Why Citadel and Army Painter?
Both brands have been around long enough to have earned their place at the top. The ranges are huge, the quality is consistent, and crucially, they’re both all over YouTube. If you pick up a Citadel or Army Painter set and search for a painting guide for your army, you’ll find one. That matters more than people realise when you’re just starting out.
Citadel does something clever with their naming. If you’ve decided to paint a Thousand Sons army, there’s literally a paint in the range called Thousand Sons Blue. That’s not a coincidence, it’s a range built around the hobby itself, and for a beginner that kind of signposting is genuinely helpful.
Army Painter takes it even further. They produce entire paint sets dedicated to specific Space Marine chapters, so if you’ve just picked up your first box of Imperial Fists, there’s a set built exactly for that. It doesn’t get much more beginner friendly than that. Army Painter paints also come in dropper bottles rather than pots, which is worth knowing. Dropper bottles help stop your paint drying out, and make getting consistent ratios when mixing colours much easier.
Both brands also have massive YouTube communities built around them, so whatever army you’ve chosen, finding a paint scheme and a step by step guide using these ranges is easy. That support network is worth its weight in gold when you’re starting out.
What to Avoid in the Citadel Range
Before we get into recommendations, a quick word on two parts of the Citadel range worth skipping for now.
Citadel Dry paints are a thicker, drier formula designed specifically for a technique called drybrushing. Here’s the thing, drybrushing is a brilliant technique and well worth learning, but you absolutely do not need a specialist paint to do it. Any standard Citadel or Army Painter paint works perfectly fine for drybrushing. The Dry range is an upsell you don’t need yet.
Citadel Air paints are thinned specifically for airbrushing. As a beginner you almost certainly don’t own an airbrush, and if you did, you can thin any standard paint down to airbrush consistency yourself. Skip these entirely for now.
Oh, and one more thing. Corax White. It’s got a very poor track record across the warhammer community for being incredibly hard to get looking right. Avoid it like the plague. You’ll thank us later.
Breaking Down the Paint Types
You’ll see a few terms thrown around when shopping for paints. Here’s what they actually mean without the jargon:
Base and Layer paints are your bread and butter. Base paints are slightly thicker and give good coverage in one coat. Layer paints are slightly thinner for finer detail work. As a complete beginner, don’t get too hung up on the difference, for all it’s worth right now they both do the same job, putting colour on your models.
Contrast and Shade paints are where things get interesting. Contrast paints are thin, vibrant, and flow across your model heavily influenced by whatever colour is underneath them. Shade paints are, frankly, liquid talent. They flow into the recessed areas of your model on their own, creating instant shadow and depth effects. Both are well worth having in your collection from the start.
Citadel vs Army Painter: Which Should You Buy?
Citadel: The Consistent Choice
Citadel sits at around £2.70 to £2.80 per pot for base and layer paints, and up to around £4.80 for contrast and shade paints. They’re the more expensive option, but not by a huge margin.
What you get for that price is consistency. Pot after pot, Citadel paints deliver reliable quality, and the range is so well mapped to Warhammer armies that shopping for exactly what you need is straightforward. Apart from the aforementioned Corax White disaster, you genuinely can’t go wrong with them.
It’s worth noting that Citadel’s bundle options are limited and often don’t give you a complete range of what you need. You’re better off handpicking individual pots based on your army’s colour scheme, which is actually easier than it sounds thanks to their army themed naming.
Best for: Painters who want reliability and are building toward a specific Warhammer army.
Army Painter: The Wallet Friendly Option
Army Painter comes in at roughly £0.10 to £0.30 cheaper per pot, which doesn’t sound like much until you’re buying thirty paints at once. The real value though is in their bundles, which is where Army Painter truly shines over Citadel. Comprehensive, well thought out sets at genuinely good prices, well worth looking at before buying individual pots.
The quality difference between Army Painter and Citadel is minimal to none most of the time. For a beginner, you are very unlikely to notice any difference at all and as mentioned before, the dropper bottles are worth their weight in gold.
Best for: Beginners wanting to keep costs down, anyone who would prefer the dropper bottles or anyone wanting to pick up a chapter specific starter set.
Our Recommendations
Budget Pick: Army Painter Starter Set A brilliant entry point. Good range of colours, great value, and everything you need to get started without breaking the bank.
Stretch Pick: Citadel Individual Pots Rather than a bundle, pick up a selection of Citadel base paints tailored to your army’s colour scheme, and add a couple of shade paints on top. The shades alone will make your models look ten times better with very little effort, and Citadel’s army themed naming makes picking the right colours surprisingly straightforward.
The Bottom Line
You don’t need to spend a fortune to get started. Pick one brand, grab a starter set or a handful of pots, and get painting. The best paint set is the one that gets you to actually put brush to model, and both Citadel and Army Painter will do that job brilliantly.
All prices correct at time of writing. Affiliate links are used on this site, meaning we may earn a small commission if you purchase through our links, at no extra cost to you.