Highlights on Dark Hair: 11 Current Looks For 2025

Playing with hair shades is fun, if, of course, you trust the work to a professional. When we come to a beauty salon in search of an update, we often cannot formulate what exactly we want. So, if you have dark brown or black hair, read our recommendations, we have selected the best ideas for your transformation!

How do you make your dark hair stand out?

First of all, you have to decide what effect you want to achieve. Some people prefer ombre or light highlights, which add a sparkling reflection to the main hair color and look very natural. Others prefer more distinct color transitions or individual color areas, which makes any hairstyle more prominent and noticeable.

Dark hair benefits from adding contrasting color accents such as platinum, deep red, copper, violet, or lighter shades such as caramel, hazel, copper, toffee, etc. It is also important to choose a shade that will harmoniously match your skin tone. Bronze, copper, and rich red shades will give dark skin a blooming and radiant look. Medium skin tones will benefit from intense brown, copper, and toffee shades. Fair-skinned beauties can use blonde, platinum, ash, and caramel shades.

We have selected 11 looks for you that best demonstrate the hottest hair color trends of 2025.

Shimmery Light Brown Highlights

To add a new twist to your hair, try adding a color that is close to your tone. This will create a shimmering, natural glow effect. Start at the crown and stretch to the ends, and the highlights in your hair will look very natural.

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Glints of steel and gray hair

Gray hair is no longer a granny privilege! Dyeing your hair “to look gray” is a very fashionable trend, especially among young people. But if you are not ready to change your hair color radically, you can experiment with neutral gray or light blue highlights.

Purple + Black

A stunning combination of two colors. Purple strands will add zest and sharpness to your hair. You can experiment with shades of purple, the main thing is that they are all cold tones. Currant, ripe cherry, lingonberry, lilac, and cornflower-blue highlights look great in black hair.

Silky and smooth strands

Very subtle light brown highlights softly frame the face. They are ideal if you have a round or heart-shaped face, and if you prefer copper or honey highlights. Other contrasting colors will overwhelm the look, so stick to soft golden tones.

Thin and soft highlights

Highlights don’t have to be just bright. For those new to hair coloring, or just wanting to highlight their natural black or chestnut color, you can choose a highlight shade that’s just one shade lighter than your base color. This is the best option if you’re doing highlights for the first time and are worried about how they’ll look on your hair.

Pinkcurls

Pink is not a color that you often see on black hair. But it’s all about the shade. While blondes usually gravitate toward pastels, black-haired beauties opt for deep pink or rose red. It looks bright and very modern.

Soft Balayage

Hair dark at the roots and light at the ends is a great idea for those with thin, lifeless hair, as this combination gives the effect of volume. The soft gradation of color in the hairstyle looks very natural and modern.

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Light Brown Ombre

Shay Mitchell

If your natural hair color is black, pairing it with platinum highlights will create a dramatic effect that’s not exactly popular right now. Shay Mitchell offers a more elegant and sophisticated solution: black fades into milky chocolate. In this case, the occasional platinum highlight on the ends looks appropriate.

Luxury Copper

Eva Longoria

One of the “Desperate Housewives”, Eva Longoria, has become a recognized style icon, so we can’t miss the opportunity to adopt her look. Now Eva chooses copper strands in dark chocolate hair. The copper shade wonderfully matches the base hair color and emphasizes the tan.

Warm caramel

Penelope Cruz

Penelope Cruz’s new look is reminiscent of dark chocolate with a sweet caramel crust. Caramel-honey highlights on a dark brown base will emphasize the texture of the hair and increase volume, they go well with a warm eye color and skin tone.

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Glamorous Chic

Kim Kardashian

Kim Kardashian looks chic with copper highlights that frame the contours of her layered haircut. The soft transition from graduated ends to dark brown roots adds volume to the hairstyle and especially emphasizes the layered structure of the haircut. Isn’t this Hollywood glamour chic?

As we can see, all celebrities actively use ombre and highlights in their hairstyles to catch the admiring glances of fans on the red carpet and other outstanding events. Following their examples and borrowing ideas, create your own unique individual style.