The Best Watercolour Brushes UK

Written by Paul Worrall

Watercolour is genuinly the medium where brush quality matters most, and it’s not close. Oil and acrylic painters can get away with a mediocre brush because the paint itself does a lot of the work. Watercolour relies entirely on how well a brush holds and releases water and pigment in a controlled way — a poor brush turns even good paint into an unpredictable mess, while a genuinly good one makes technique feel far more achievable than it actually is.

I’ve spent 16 years in the UK art supplies industry and now run Discount Art Supplies, used by over 41,000 UK artists every week. This is the honest breakdown of what’s actually worth buying, at every budget.

1. Winsor & Newton Series 7 — Best Overall

Series 7 was actually designed as a watercolour brush long before miniature painters adopted it, and it remains the genuine benchmark the whole category gets measured against. Made from Kolinsky sable, it holds an exceptional amount of water and pigment while still springing back to a fine point reliably, stroke after stroke — the combination that separates a good watercolour brush from a great one.

It’s a premium price point and it demands proper care, but for anyone serious about the medium, it’s genuinly worth the investment. This is the brush most professional watercolourists reach for first, and that reputation is earned rather than marketed.

2. Da Vinci Maestro — Best Premium Alternative

Da Vinci’s Maestro range is a genuine rival to Series 7, made from the same premium Kolinsky sable and preferred by some professional watercolourists specifically for its slightly different snap and belly shape. It’s less about one being objectively better than the other and more about which feels right in your hand — worth trying both if you can before committing to premium sable prices.

The quality control across the range is genuinly excellent, and like Series 7, it rewards proper care with a long working life.

3. Escoda Versátil — Best Synthetic

Synthetic watercolour brushes have genuinly closed most of the performance gap with natural sable over the last decade, and Escoda’s Versátil range is one of the clearest examples of how far that’s come. It holds water and colour surprisingly well for a synthetic, at a noticeably lower price than Kolinsky sable, and it’s spared the more delicate handling natural hair demands.

It’s a genuinly sensible choice for artists who want strong performance without treating brush care as a small ritual, or who work in conditions where a natural hair brush’s fragility becomes inconvenient.

4. Princeton Neptune — Best for Large Washes

Neptune is a synthetic squirrel-hair alternative, built specifically to mimic the extraordinary water-holding capacity of natural squirrel hair without the price or the fragility. For laying down large, smooth washes — skies, backgrounds, big open areas of colour — it genuinly outperforms most other brushes on this list, natural or synthetic.

It’s not built for fine detail work the way Series 7 or Da Vinci is, and that’s fine — it’s not trying to be. As a dedicated wash brush alongside a more precise detail brush, it fills a genuine gap in a working watercolourist’s kit.

5. Pro Arte Prolene — Best Budget

Pro Arte is a genuinly well-regarded British brand, and the Prolene range is the honest starting point for anyone new to watercolour who doesn’t want to spend Series 7 money before knowing whether the medium suits them. It holds a decent point and reasonable colour load for the price, without the compromises you’d expect at this end of the market.

It won’t match the premium brushes on this list for extended washes or fine control, but as a genuinly capable first set to learn technique on, it’s one of the best value picks available in the UK.

Which Brush Shape Do You Actually Need?

Round brushes are the genuine workhorse of watercolour — a fine point for detail, a fuller belly for holding colour, and enough versatility to cover most of a painting on their own. If you only buy one brush, buy a round.

Flat brushes give crisp, controlled edges and are genuinly useful for architectural work, skies, and anywhere you want a clean straight line rather than the softer edge a round produces.

Mop brushes hold an enormous amount of water and are built specifically for large, loose washes — the Princeton Neptune above is essentially a mop shape.

Rigger brushes are long and thin, built for fine linear detail — grasses, rigging on boats (hence the name), delicate branches — work a standard round can’t achieve with the same control.

Which Should You Buy?

If you want the genuine benchmark and don’t mind the care routine, Winsor & Newton Series 7 is the standout choice. Da Vinci Maestro is an equally excellent alternative worth trying alongside it. Escoda is the sensible synthetic pick for strong performance without the fuss, and Princeton Neptune is worth adding specifically for large washes. Pro Arte Prolene is where to start if you’re new to watercolour and want to learn before spending more.

To round out your kit, our guides to the best watercolour paper and watercolour paints for beginners are worth reading alongside this one.