Rainbow french tip nails have been around for a little bit now and they are everywhere. People love them because they look so fun and creative. But sometimes it is hard to figure out if you are doing french tips perfectly, and what color goes with what.

So for those of you who have been looking for a guide on how to do these nails correctly, I have put together a quick tutorial that covers the basics of french tip nails. With this article, you will be able to paint your nails in a rainbow of colors to match every outfit and season!

What you will need?

A nail buffer. This is a nail buffer that looks like a big ole toothbrush! You will be using this to scrub your nails down until they are nice and smooth. This may not sound fun, but trust me, it is worth it. Try this out one time and you will fall in love with the smoothest nails ever! A set of nail polish remover pads.

I highly suggest purchasing these instead of the ones that come with your bottle. The ones that come with your bottle are pretty useless because they are way too thick to remove polish easily, but the pads are much thinner and work much better for french tips.

A bottle of your chosen polish. If you want a rainbow of colors, I suggest getting a pack of 12! A top coat nail polish. This will close the “french tip lines” and make everything look neat and clean!

How to do it:

Start by polishing your nails as you normally would. In the photo below I am using a black base coat, then a light pink color as my first coat. Next comes down to personal preference about how many coats you want. The more coats you use the more solid the colors will be, but it also makes it harder to see what you are doing! It is up to you how many coats you want to use.

Once you have finished with your base coat, the next step is the one that saves you time and effort! It is using your buffer! You can do this part by hand or with an electric buffer. I highly recommend doing it by hand because it gets rid of all the little bumps and crags in your nail. This is especially important if you are doing french tips to match a subtle polish color.

Once you have buffed out all of those little bumps, now would be a good time to apply your top coat. Apply a thick coat of top coat to your nails, and let it dry. Then you will be able to remove the excess using a cotton swab. If you don’t know what a swab is, check out this article about removing nail polish from skin !

The next step is very popular with teens because it makes your french tip look much more professional! You can buy nail tape at most drugstores like CVS, RiteAid, Walgreens, etc. I am sure if you look hard enough you can find it at beauty supplies like Sally’s! It comes in different sizes depending on how big or small of an area you want to cover up with it.

You can also do this step by hand and then use a thinner tip of tape to cover the french tip. Last step is to paint on your french tip color. There are several different ways of doing this depending on personal preference and color choice. If you want to make dots like above, get a regular paint brush and get it really wet (like using a regular sponge).

Then get your dotting tool and draw out one semi-circle at a time making sure the point is about an inch away from your cuticle line (the line inside your nail that isn’t painted on). You can also use a regular paint brush and pick up small amounts of polish and then apply them directly onto the nail.

Now that you have followed this tutorial, there’s nothing left to do but look at some really cool and colorful rainbow french tip nails!

Thanks for reading this article and I hope it helps you and makes your french tips more fun than ever!