Snowflake Coloring Pages

Why every snowflake has six arms

When water freezes, its molecules lock together in a six-sided pattern, so a snow crystal grows out from a tiny hexagon in six directions at once. Each arm meets the same cold and the same damp air on its way down, which is why the arms of one snowflake match so closely — and why every snowflake in this set has six arms too. The realistic page is the kind scientists call a stellar dendrite, a star with fern-like branches, and the magnifying glass page has a boy examining one that has landed on his mitten, with a notebook and pencil ready beside him.

Snowflakes for little hands

The five easy pages are drawn big and simple. The chunky snowflake has a large heart at its centre and round bobbles on its tips; the kawaii snowflake smiles out from under a bobble hat. A girl in a puffy coat catches snowflakes on her tongue, and a penguin in earmuffs holds one up that is nearly as big as it is. The tracing sheet has four snowflakes drawn in dashed lines — two with V-shaped branches, one with round tips and one with a hexagon in the middle — for going over with a crayon before colouring.

Paper snowflakes and cut-outs

The cut-out sheet has four snowflakes with a dotted line around each. Colour them, cut them out and string them into a garland or tape them to a window. On another page two children make real paper snowflakes at a little table: fold a square of thin paper into a narrow wedge, snip notches and holes along both edges, then unfold it. There is also a snowflake mobile of five different flakes on beaded strings, and a plate of iced snowflake cookies.

Heart snowflakes and cat snowflakes

The heart snowflake is one flake built entirely out of hearts, arm after arm, like a paper-cut pattern. The cat snowflake works the same way with six cats sitting in a ring around a paw print. There is a snowflake fairy with a crystal crown and a star wand, and a polar bear cub riding on its mother’s back, reaching for a snowflake while another lands on her nose.

Detailed snowflakes for adults

The six detailed pages suit coloured pencils. The stained glass window sets a snowflake of glass pieces in a round frame; the lace doily rings a flower with six snowflake motifs and a scalloped edge; the geometric pattern is a tile of hexagons, a snowflake in each. One giant snowflake holds a whole winter world, with a log cabin and a frozen pond in its centre and a snowman, a sledge, an owl and mountains between its arms, and LET IT SNOW is lettered in bubble letters filled with tiny flakes.

Print the whole set at once

The button at the top of this page bundles all twenty into a single download, so you can print the lot for a classroom or a snow day rather than picking through them one at a time. Every page comes as a PDF in both US Letter and A4.

What to colour them with

Snowflakes do not have to be white. Try one colour per arm, cool blues and purples fading outward, or a different pattern on each pair of opposite arms. Crayons suit the easy pages; the crystal, the doily and the geometric pattern are better with sharp coloured pencils.

More winter pages

For the rest of the season see the winter coloring pages, the snowman coloring pages and the January coloring pages, and for December there are twenty Christmas coloring pages and twenty Christmas wreath coloring pages.