We spent an unreasonable amount of time agonizing over the lineweights on these aquatic predators.
It is a massive problem when the vector paths are too thin for a blunt crayon to actually register. So we thickened up the borders on these printable shark coloring pages.
You just click the thumbnail of the shark coloring sheet they want. The file renders instantly without jumping through weird digital hoops.
Feed some paper into the tray. Let them go totally feral with the gray markers.
Featured Shark Coloring Pages
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Shark Coloring Pages Highlights
Just the Dorsal Fin
Sometimes less is more for tired kids. This is literally just a single dorsal fin slicing through the water with some puffy clouds behind it.
Honestly it is the easiest one for the little guys to finish before losing focus. Kids can go heavy on the blue crayon here without ruining any tricky details. It might cause some inconvenience if they press too hard and snap the crayon.
Wide Open Jaws
Here we have a massive great white heading toward the surface with its mouth completely open. You can clearly see rows of jagged teeth and the flat water line right above its snout. It is an intense angle.
My boys naturally want to color the inside of the mouth dark red. It looks terrifying on the fridge… but they think it’s cool.
Jumping Out of the Water
This shark is breaching or porpoising right out of the choppy waves. There is a huge chaotic splash at the bottom that takes up a good chunk of the page.
Getting those water droplets to look right is a fun challenge. Older kids will definitely appreciate the kinetic energy happening here. I think it looks exhausting.
The Mid-Strike Roll
This one is aggressive because the animal is rolling its eye back white during a strike. The mouth is open wide and heavy water is crashing all around its lower half.
It is a solid biology lesson hiding in a simple activity. Or rather… a chance to explain why these predators look so creepy when they bite.
Vertical Spy-Hopping
A great white is popping straight up out of the calm water to just look around. The background just has a few fluffy clouds and a completely flat horizon line.
We kept the sky pretty bare on purpose. Kids can draw their own boats or weird sea birds in that blank space. It is a nice canvas for whatever scenario they invent.
Cruising the Current
Hammerheads have that bizarre alien look that completely fascinates my seven-year-old. This guy is gliding through some wavy current lines in deep open water.
The current boundaries let you use a few different shades of blue. Will they actually color inside those swirling lines? No idea.
Along the Reef Drop-Off
We drew this hammerhead swimming right next to a steep coral reef drop-off. There are some tubular sponges and weird coral shapes creeping up the left side of the page. It adds great texture.
These types of sharks coloring pages are a nice excuse to use colors other than gray. Break out the neon pinks and oranges for the reef stuff.
Night Hunting
This is my favorite because it shows the shark using electroreception at night under a crescent moon. You can see these radar waves bouncing off a tiny fish hiding near the bottom rocks. It looks a bit like wifi signals under the sea.
And what follows from this? This specific shark coloring sheet always sparks a million questions about how animals see in the dark.
Tips for Coloring Sharks Coloring Pages
1. Skip the Flat Gray
These predators aren’t just one boring color like a concrete sidewalk. They actually have a natural countershading thing going on where their bellies are white and their tops are dark.
Tell your kids to leave the stomach area completely blank. Then they can press hard with a silver or dark gray crayon on the top half.
2. The Red Tooth Debate
Listen. Your kids are definitely going to want to color the teeth red.
Just let them do it and save yourself the exhausting argument. It makes the printable shark coloring pages look completely feral but they will be so proud of it.
3. Layering the Ocean
Water isn’t just a single flat shade of blue. It changes wildly depending on how deep the ocean floor is at that exact spot.
Have them lay down a light blue base first on the free shark coloring pages and scribble dark purple over the corners. All this coloring technique comes down to one thing: don’t overcomplicate the ocean.
4. Brightening Up the Reefs
For the hammerhead pages with the coral drop-offs you really need to contrast the gray animal. Use the loudest colors in the box for those weird sea sponges.
Hot pink and electric yellow work perfectly against the muddy ocean water. It brings the whole picture to life instead of looking dismal.
5. Dealing with Splashes
The water droplets on the breaching pages can be a total nightmare to color individually. Don’t make them color every single circle blue.
Instead they should just lightly shade the background and leave the splash droplets blank. This makes the water look like it is actually foaming and crashing.
6. Nighttime Blues
That one night hunting page needs a completely different approach for the sky. A regular blue crayon won’t cut it under that sharp crescent moon.
We usually mix black and dark navy together to get a proper midnight vibe. It makes the yellow moon pop out like crazy.
7. Markers vs Crayons
Markers are great but they bleed through standard printer paper like crazy. If you are using cheap copy paper definitely stick to crayons or colored pencils.
If they insist on markers you better put a thick magazine under the paper. Otherwise you’ll be scrubbing Sharpie off your kitchen table for around 41 minutes.
8. The Smudge Technique
Sharks have smooth skin that feels a bit like rough sandpaper. But they look incredibly slick when they are wet.
If you use colored pencils you can literally rub the gray areas with a tissue to blend the pencil strokes. This is an old art teacher trick that makes any shark coloring sheet look polished.