Most pink pens have a similar pink color for the body of the pen. So you’d think they all have much the same ink color… but not necessarily. While some pens look like carbon copies both in appearance and ink color (PaperMate Inkjoy Gel 0.7 and the BLOT Gel pens), some actually come out a very light shade of pink. And then there’s different ink thicknesses.

Since I have so many pink pens (as it’s the color I tend to use to code blog posts in my planner), I grabbed most of them and did some swatches..

As you can see I’ve done quite thorough… research…  (i.e. shopping!) to compare many well known brands.

Some of the well known brands have cheaper alternatives.. which have much the same ink color. E.g. Papermate Flair UF and the Inklab fineliner.

I certainly notice cheap pens like target generic brand gel pens, Daiso etc. tend to dry out faster, but when they’re so cheap it’s to be expected.

While the Kaisercraft gel pens write smoothly and have a nice glitter effect to the ink they dry out way too quickly (especially for the price).

The Caliart pens are like the Staedtler Triplus Fineliner. Both look like a 0.7mm thickness however are only 0.38mm and 0.3mm respectively… yet another reason I buy so many pens! Half the time they don’t end up the right shade or thickness that you thought they’d be.

Pen Testing

Pen testing in the Plum Paper Planner.

Left page

As you can see, most of the marker pens are prone to bleed through. The thicker gel pens are usually prone to ghosting. Ballpoint are typically the least prone to ghosting (and tend to be cheaper than gel pens).

Right page

There’s quite a lot of swatches in the above photos, so if you’re a bit overwhelmed, here are some recommendations:

Some of my favorite pen brands

• Papermate
• Pilot
• Staedtler fineliners
• Schneider Topliner (it feels like the pen writes itself – just glides across the page – one of the best pens ever to write with)
• MUJI gel pen
• Ooly color connect
• Stabilo fine tip
• Caliart
• Inklab (like a cheaper version of the flairs)
• KACOGREEN Pure
• Paperchase
• Sharpie Pen
• Uni Pi’s dual tip – the fat end tends to bleed through paper but the colors are really bright and the yellow is one of my favorite yellows)
• Tombow twin tone – bright colors and dual tip

Some pens I don’t recommend

• Staedtler ball 432M (ballpoint) – prone to ink skipping
• Smiggle – for the same reasons as the Staedtler – the 2 look eerily similar
• Needle tip (too scratchy and the ink is prone to skipping)
• Pentel – super expensive and I don’t really see a difference in quality
• Parkoo erasable pen – the ink is prone to skipping
• KOKOYU Ball – ink almost always skips
• CHOSCH – even though it’s 0.5, the ink is too thin – more like a 0.3mm

So many different shades of pink!

Pink isn’t the only color where the ink color varies – blue tends to vary a lot too.

And if you need a reason to justify pen shopping, different shades of the same color are ideal for ombre spreads!

Ombre weekly spread in the Life Inspired Plans Planner

More pen reviews:

• The best white pens for writing on black paper
• Favorite Twin Tip Markers for Planning (Roundup)
• Pens & Highlighters Smear Testing: Which ones don’t smear 

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