This post may contain affiliate links that support the site at no cost to you.

Painting a single fingernail a different color is a trend that has been around for years with no signs of stopping. 

Almost every Pinterest inspo photo or TikTok maintenance day routine will boas a couple of different color nails. Social media would almost make you think it’s boring to have just one color.

Whether you’re seeing a nail artist in a nail salon or DIYing it like me, a different color on your ring finger is a great way to make your mani stand out. 

In this post, you’ll find ideas for the painting one nail a different color trend, myths and reasons for why people paint one nail a different color, and what it means when a man paints one nail. And of course at the end I had to put painting one nail a different color inspo pics!

What is the painting one nail a different color trend?

It’s simple and straightforward! You paint one nail a different color. 

It’s most commonly the ring finger but you sometimes see it as the middle finger too. I do think the ring finger looks the most balanced. Setting the index finger or pinky as a different color looks lopsided. I remember a girl in college saying that painting a middle finger nail a different color looks like you’re always giving someone the middle finger (which could be a selling point for some people!). 

For this trend, four nails on each hand are all one color and the fifth nail is different — an “accent nail”. Glitter accent nails are a cute and popular way to do this. So is a solid polish on four nails and nail art or a pattern or texture on the fifth. Or, you could do a nude or pale pink on four nails and a bright nail for the fifth. 

This trend is separate from rainbow nails or tonal nails, where every nail is a different, closely related shade. It’s also different than a full on set of nail art where there’s something “extra” added to each nail or most nails. And finally, it’s not when you have two or three colors spread out across the ten fingernails — that’s a slightly different trend (and maybe a little out in 2024?). 

Myths about painting one nail a different color trend

A funny thing about being my age (late 30s) is we had the internet growing up, but not like the kids do today where they can ask Google all their deepest worries. We didn’t even have Google yet until I was in college. 

So what that means for you young ones: sometimes someone would tell you something that was inaccurate and you would just go on to believe that wrong thing for 20 years. So in the wild world of 1990s urban legends and homophobia, painting one nail a different color meant that you were a lesbian. (Honestly in the late 90s urban legend speak, everything meant you were gay.) 

So from the vantage point of a much more enlightened 2024, I went looking as I prepared to write this article for some kind of evidence that this urban legend was out there and couldn’t find any! Snopes, wyd? However — I did find a couple of articles including this Jezebel article from 2012 suggesting that femme lesbians adopt a nail-painting strategy to signal their orientation to other queer women. But it doesn’t seem like that ever took off as a trend. R/lesbians is much quicker to recommend a rainbow manicure than the “finger-flagging” system that the Jezebel article recommends. 

What does it mean when a man paints one nail?

I had never heard of this before I started gearing up to write this post! The founders are Australian, and though it’s gaining attention in the US through the efforts of people like actor Tyler Blackburn, it’s not as prominent here. 

But this man, Elliot Costello, started the Polished Man campaign to raise awareness about physical and sexual violence. The premise of the Polished Man platform is that while most men are not violent, most do not do as much as they could to pressure other men against violence. 

So, to raise awareness and start conversations, men can paint one nail or all of them. The idea is that someone will ask them why it’s painted, and they can educate that person about the charity and the sad reality that half of children will experience physical or sexual abuse each year. It’s an interesting way of flipping male gender expectations around: people ask about the nail painting because it’s not “typically masculine”, and then the participant gets a chance to advocate for a definition of typical masculinity that doesn’t involve or condone violence. 

I was very moved reading the account of how the charity came to be and its donations to trauma prevention programs. I won’t reprint the whole thing here but little Thea’s story will break your heart. There’s more on the Polished Man project website if you’re interested in getting involved.  

Okay, show me some nails

First, I can’t believe I’m citing Lindsay Lohan in 2024 but I love these glittered french manicures — and I love them more in the knowledge that they were for the recent Mean Girls premiere, because in 2004 if you didn’t have a french manicure you were nobodyyyy. (And remember how they used to airbrush the tips?!)

I love the tonal nail polish colors on this one–different shades of the same pink—and the way that this nail art look adds both a different color and the additional element of the glitter but stays cohesive. 

This is from the same creator as above — love this version of the accent nail trend with black nail polish! I’d love to see these in a coffin tip. (if you click through to her account she has a lot of really pretty DIY-friendly inspo).

Another black polish base but the nude looks so chic! Totally doable at home. 

And of course press-ons are made for this trend — grab two sets in the same color family and swap out a couple in each set. You’ve got your next two sets plus accent nails sorted out. 

Is your next manicure in here somewhere?