Supplies
Every Disney Mystery Coloring book
Nine volumes, a hundred numbered illustrations in each, and a character you do not get to see until you have coloured it. Here is what separates them.
The series is colour by number with a licence attached. Each page is split into numbered areas with a key printed on the same sheet, and nothing tells you who is underneath. That single decision is why these hold people who abandon an ordinary coloring page: there is something to find out, and the only way to find it out is to keep going.
All nine English volumes are published by Random House Worlds, run to 128 pages, and use the same format. New ones arrive every few months, and this page is checked against the publisher’s catalogue rather than kept from memory. The difference between them is the cast and the palette, and that matters more than it sounds: a dark volume stays unreadable longer, which changes how the reveal feels. A second and much larger series exists from Hachette Heroes, covered further down.
The character volumes
These three are the ones to start with, because the cast is recognisable from a third of the way in. That early recognition is what keeps a child at the table.
Disney Mystery Coloring: The ClassicsBook
Colour by number, and the character only appears as you go. It holds a child who gives up on an open page, because there is something to find out.
Disney Mystery Coloring: PrincessesBook
Ariel, Belle, Rapunzel and the rest, hidden until the numbers are filled. The volume most often bought first, and the one that holds a child longest.
Disney Mystery Coloring: PixarBook
Colour by number across Toy Story, Monsters Inc., WALL-E and Ratatouille. Same format as The Classics: the character stays hidden until enough numbers are filled.
The themed volumes
Same format, organised around an idea rather than a studio. Family is the gentlest, Villains the darkest, Love Stories the obvious February purchase.
Disney Mystery Coloring: FamilyBook
The volume built around Lilo and Stitch and the family films. The easiest of the series to share between an adult and a child, because the reveal works for both.
Disney Mystery Coloring: Disney VillainsBook
Ursula, Cruella, Jafar, Maleficent. The darkest palette of the series, which makes the reveal sharper: the page stays unreadable much longer.
Disney Mystery Coloring: Love StoriesBook
The couples, from Cinderella to Tangled. The obvious February purchase, and the one to pair with our free Valentine sheets.
Disney Mystery Coloring: SeasonsBook
The newest of the six, and the one to buy in autumn. Same hundred numbered illustrations, arranged around winter, spring, summer and fall.
The two that change the drawing itself
Stained Glass redraws everything as leaded glass, so every area is bounded by a thick black line. It is the most forgiving volume in the series, and the best one for anyone whose hand still wanders. Illusions does the opposite: the illustrations play with perspective and hidden shapes, and what appears is often not what the first twenty numbers suggested. It is the hardest of the nine.
Disney Mystery Coloring: Stained GlassBook
Every illustration drawn as leaded glass, so the areas are bounded by thick black lines. The most forgiving of the series for anyone who colours slightly outside.
Disney Mystery Coloring: IllusionsBook
The trickiest of the nine. The illustrations play on perspective and hidden shapes, so what appears is not always what the first twenty numbers suggested.
The other series, from Hachette Heroes
Random House Worlds is not the only publisher doing this. Hachette Heroes has been running a mystery colouring line since 2015, and it is far larger: over a hundred volumes in French, of which a growing set is translated and sold as Mystery Colouring. Those editions are in English, printed at 300 by 215 mm, which is noticeably larger than the Random House books, on paper heavy enough that markers do not come through.
They are worth knowing about even if the volume you want is only in French, because on a colour by number book the text is a key and a page number. There is nothing to read. A French edition colours identically to an English one, and it is often the only way to get a subject the English line has not covered yet.
The English-language ones currently on Amazon are Classics by Number, Classics for Beginners, Princesses and its second volume, Pixar, Family, Heroes & Villains and Portraits, which is the one that draws characters as faces rather than scenes.
The French line goes much further, and several volumes reach Amazon directly. The Grands Classiques Tome 12 is deep into a series that has run since 2015, the Grands Classiques Collector is the tenth-anniversary hardback, and the Grands Classiques Best of collects the illustrations people ask for most. All three are in French, and all three colour exactly like an English one.
Coloriages Mystères: Grands Classiques 13Book
The thirteenth volume of the French series, and proof of how far it runs. A hundred numbered pages across Frozen, Encanto, Rapunzel, the Aristocats and Beauty and the Beast. French cover, English-free contents.
The rest are listed as links rather than as cards because Hachette publishes cover images for only part of its catalogue, and we would rather show nothing than show a neighbouring volume.
Which one to start with
If you are buying for someone else and cannot ask, take a character volume rather than a themed one. The cast does half the work: a page that resolves into Ariel or Woody after twenty numbers keeps someone going, where an abstract reveal asks for patience they may not have yet.
These are original Disney publications, not something this site makes. Nothing here is affiliated with or endorsed by Disney, and the coloring books page covers the rest of the shelf.
Links to Amazon on this page are affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases: the price is the same for you either way, and nothing here is recommended because of it. How this site is paid for.
Keep browsing
Disney Mystery Coloring questions
How many Disney Mystery Coloring books are there?
Nine from Random House Worlds: The Classics, Princesses, Pixar, Family, Disney Villains, Illusions, Seasons, Stained Glass and Love Stories. A second, much larger series exists from Hachette Heroes, over a hundred volumes since 2015, of which several are translated and sold in English as Mystery Colouring.
What is a Disney mystery coloring book?
A colour by number book. Each of the hundred illustrations is split into numbered areas with a key on the page, and the character is not named or previewed. You find out who it is as the page fills, which is the whole appeal.
Which Disney Mystery Coloring book should I buy first?
The Classics or Princesses. Both hold recognisable characters that appear early enough to keep a child going. Illusions is the hardest and the least suitable as a first book, and Stained Glass is the most forgiving if colouring inside the lines is still a work in progress. Hachette’s Classics for Beginners is the gentlest starting point of either series.
What age are they for?
Eight and up for solo colouring, younger with help. The areas are small and there are twenty to forty colours per page, which is a lot of looking up for a small child. The reveal, though, works at any age, which is why they get shared.
Do I need special pens for them?
Coloured pencils. The areas are small enough that a marker tip covers several at once, and the printed number needs covering rather than drowning. The pencils page covers which ones.