Clare is a good paint sold to people who find the color decision harder than the painting. The wall paint is a soft zero-VOC eggshell at $77 a gallon, honest on two coats, quiet on a bedroom wall. What you are really buying is the edit: fewer than eighty colors and a $3 peel-and-stick swatch that reads correctly in your own light. Buy it when the color is the hard part and the job is one room. Skip it for a whole house or a color you already love elsewhere.
- +The $3 peel-and-stick swatch goes on the actual wall, so you watch a color turn cool at breakfast and warm at five before you spend a gallon
- +Someone genuinely edited this deck: the greiges do not go pink in the wrong light and the whites have deliberate undertones
- +The eggshell sits lower than most, so it drapes almost like a matte without a matte's cleaning penalty
- +Wall Paint and Trim Paint are tinted from the same color library, so one shade runs wall to trim with no cross-brand shift
- +Zero VOC at 2 g/L and GREENGUARD Gold certified, which means a nursery is liveable the same evening
- +Honest two-coat hide going mid-tone to mid-tone, and forgiving enough that a first-time roller gets a clean wall
- +No store trip and no tint wait: the order ships to your door, free over $200
- −Walls come in eggshell only. No flat for a room that should swallow light, no satin or semi-gloss for a wall that takes wear
- −There is no color matching at all, so a Benjamin Moore or Sherwin-Williams shade you already love cannot be bought here
- −Every order is final sale, including paint, swatches and fan decks, so a wrong color is money gone
- −$77 a gallon with no store fallback, no 5-gallon size, and quart sizes that cycle in and out of stock
- −The eggshell burnishes in a busy hallway, and the acrylic trim paint stays softer than a waterborne alkyd on daily-use cabinets
- −Ceiling paint and primer are $49 gallons doing jobs a $23 to $26 big-box gallon does about as well
The Line Ladder: Which Clare Paint to Buy
Clare's lineup is small enough to read in one sitting: one wall paint, one trim paint, one ceiling white, one primer, and the swatch program that holds the whole thing together. Prices are direct from clare.com in 2026, and they do not move on a sale calendar.
There Is No Sale Calendar — Here Is the Real Price
Clare does not run the promotional pricing model that makes Sherwin-Williams shoppers wait for a sale weekend. There is one price, it is the price on the site, and it holds: $77 for a gallon of Wall Paint or Trim Paint, $28 for a quart, $49 for the ceiling paint or the primer, $3 for a peel-and-stick swatch. Occasional site-wide promotions of roughly 10 to 15 percent turn up around Memorial Day and Black Friday, and that is the whole discount story.
The lever you do have is shipping. Free shipping starts at $200, and it is a flat ten dollars under that, so a single $77 gallon lands at $87 while a wall-plus-trim-plus-ceiling order ships free. Swatch orders of five or more ship free on their own. If you are going to buy Clare at all, plan one order that clears $200 rather than three small ones, and put the primer or the ceiling gallon in that same box instead of ordering it later.
The other half of a fair price is not overbuying, because every order is final sale. Measure the room, use the 375 to 425 square feet per gallon figure with two coats already factored in, and order the swatches first. A wrong color here is not a return trip to the counter, it is a gallon you own forever.
The Clare Color Deck
Fewer than eighty colors, and that narrowness is the product. Clare names them the way a designer would rather than by number, and the deck leans hard into warm whites, soft greiges and quiet greens, with a small bench of deep colors at the bottom.
The Cons Only Forums Talk About
Every Order Is Final Sale
Clare's returns page is blunt about it: all orders are final sale, and paint, swatches, fan decks and supplies are not eligible for a return or refund. Damaged deliveries and genuinely wrong colors get sorted out by email, but a gallon you simply do not like is yours. That policy is the reason the swatch program exists, and it is why the brand tells you outright that a screen cannot show you a color accurately. Order swatches, live with them, then buy the paint.
Almost Every Review You Find Is an Affiliate Blog
The most common complaint about Clare is not about the paint at all. It is that a search returns page after page of glowing lifestyle-blog posts and very little independent feedback, and shoppers on Reddit call that out repeatedly. It holds up when you check: the brand has essentially no presence on the ordinary consumer review sites, so there is no large pool of unfiltered buyer experience to read. You are judging the paint on the spec sheet, the certifications and a handful of hands-on reviews rather than a thousand ratings.
One Sheen on the Walls, Full Stop
Wall Paint is eggshell and nothing else. If the room wants a flat that swallows light, or a satin that takes a scrub, Clare does not sell it, and the Trim Paint's semi-gloss will show every roller line and surface flaw if you put it on a wall. For a brand whose whole pitch is getting the look right, that gap is strange. A north-facing bedroom that would look beautiful in matte is simply not a job this lineup can do.
Your Color Cannot Be Ordered Here
There is no custom tinting and no color matching. If you arrived with Revere Pewter or Agreeable Gray in your head, Clare cannot mix it in any base or any sheen, and no amount of asking changes that. The edited deck is the product, so you pick from their world or you do not buy. A Benjamin Moore dealer or a Sherwin-Williams store will match a competitor color free, which is the honest answer when you already know your shade.
No Store, No 5-Gallon, No Sunday Rescue
Clare ships from its own warehouse and nowhere else. There is no big-box pickup, no 5-gallon bucket for a big job, no quart on the shelf when quarts cycle out of stock, and nothing to do on a Sunday afternoon when you come up half a wall short except wait for a truck. On a deadline that friction is real, and it is the practical reason a whole-house repaint belongs at a paint counter even if you love the colors here.
The Questions Between Two Cans
Clare Wall Paint vs Behr Marquee
Marquee at $48 to $58 costs less, comes in four sheens, and sits on a shelf at every Home Depot with a return counter behind it. Clare gives you an edited deck, a swatch that goes on your wall, and a softer eggshell that reads quieter in low light. Pick Behr when gallons and same-day pickup drive the job, pick Clare when narrowing the color is the part you are stuck on.
Clare Trim Paint vs Benjamin Moore Advance
Advance at $80 to $95 is a waterborne alkyd: it levels its own brush marks flat and cures harder, which is what a daily-use kitchen actually needs. Clare's trim paint is 100 percent acrylic with a lower, more restrained sheen and the advantage of matching your Clare walls exactly. A few doors and casings, buy Clare. A full run of cabinets, buy Advance.
Clare vs Backdrop
The closest cross-shop, because Backdrop runs the same model: curated deck, peel-and-stick swatches, low-VOC paint shipped to your door. Backdrop is cheaper at about $59 a gallon and offers a second wall finish, so it wins on flexibility and price. Clare's edit is the tighter one and its eggshell is the softer film. Order swatches from both before you decide, since the palettes are genuinely different.
Clare vs Farrow & Ball
Both sell a curated palette instead of a fan deck, but they are not the same purchase. Farrow & Ball starts around $120 a gallon and buys you real pigment depth in dark colors that Clare's archive does not carry. Clare is half the money, easier to live with, and better at soft neutrals. If the brief is a saturated, complicated color on a formal wall, Clare is the wrong start.
Clare Swatches vs Store Sample Pots
A $3 peel-and-stick square goes straight on the wall, moves from the north side of the room to the south, and peels off clean. A sample pot costs more, needs a brush and a board, and dries to a patch you have to live with or repaint. For deciding a color, the peel-and-stick wins on almost every count. For judging sheen and how a paint actually rolls, the pot still tells you more.
Full comparison →All Clare Reviews
4 products reviewed in this brand.
Clare Questions, Answered
Is Clare paint actually good, or am I paying for the branding?
The formula is honest. It is 100 percent acrylic, zero VOC at 2 g/L, GREENGUARD Gold certified, and it covers in two real coats going mid-tone to mid-tone. It sits in the same tier as Behr Marquee or Benjamin Moore Regal Select rather than above them. The premium buys the edited palette, the peel-and-stick swatches and the delivery. Both halves are part of the price.
How much is a gallon of Clare paint?
Wall Paint and Trim Paint are $77 a gallon and $28 a quart. Ceiling Paint and the Interior/Exterior Primer are $49 a gallon, gallons only. Peel-and-stick swatches are $3 each, or $18 for a kit, and the fan deck is $35. Shipping is a flat ten dollars and free over $200. Prices do not move on a sale calendar.
Where can I buy Clare paint?
Only from clare.com. There is no Home Depot, Lowe's, or independent-dealer route, and the occasional third-party Amazon listing carries a few colors without the swatch system behind it. Orders ship from Clare's own warehouse in a few days. That also means no local pickup and no 5-gallon size, so a big job means stacking gallons and planning ahead.
Can Clare match a Benjamin Moore or Sherwin-Williams color?
No. Clare mixes only its own colors in its own bases, and there is no custom-match service at any price. If you already know you want Revere Pewter or Agreeable Gray, a Benjamin Moore dealer or a Sherwin-Williams store will match it free and mix it in any sheen. The narrow deck is the whole product here, and it is the wrong product if your color lives somewhere else.
Are the peel-and-stick swatches worth ordering first?
Yes, every time, and Clare says so itself because a screen cannot show a color honestly. The swatches go on the actual wall, so you watch a greige go cool and grey at breakfast and warm back up at four o'clock in the room you live in. Order three or four at $3 each, leave them up for a week, and buy the one that holds up all day.
Can I return Clare paint if I do not like the color?
No. All orders are final sale, and paint, swatches, fan decks and supplies are all non-returnable. Clare will make it right if the delivery is damaged or the wrong color arrives, but a gallon you simply changed your mind about is yours to keep. Measure the room, order the swatches first, and get the gallon count right on the first order.
What sheens does Clare come in?
Three, and they are tied to the product rather than chosen freely. Wall Paint is eggshell only, and it sits lower than most eggshells. Trim Paint is a subtle semi-gloss for trim, doors and cabinets. Ceiling Paint is flat white and is not a tint base. There is no matte, no satin, and no high gloss anywhere in the lineup.
Is Clare paint washable enough for a kitchen or bathroom?
It is mildew-resistant and wipes fingerprints and light scuffs with mild soap, which is fine for a powder room or a well-ventilated bath. It is not a scrub-it-daily film. In a busy hallway the eggshell burnishes before a true premium washable would, and in a small bathroom that takes daily shower steam, step the splash zones up to the semi-gloss Trim Paint or buy a bath-spec paint instead.
Ask a Question
Choosing between two Clare lines?
Ask Jessica below — every question gets a real reply, usually within a day. Ordered Clare? Tell us the color, the room's light, and whether the swatch matched the gallon once it was on the wall.