What Color Shirt Goes With Pink Shorts? (With Pics)

Pink shorts represent the best of the summer aesthetic – vibrant, fun, and carefree. However, they aren’t always the easiest item to color-coordinate. The question is, what color shirt should you wear with pink shorts? 

The easiest shirt colors to wear with pink shorts are white, grey, and black shirts. If you wanted a more vibrant shirt color to go with the pink shorts, you could consider muted shades of blue and green, or dark shades of red such as maroon or burgundy. 

While that’s the short answer, it isn’t everything you need to know. 

After going through a few tips for making it work each and every time, we’ll show some pink shorts and shirt combinations you can try out yourself. 

Color Matching Pink Shorts With Shirts: Tips

Whether you’re dressing for a garden party, the beach, or just hanging out in the park, these tips should see you through. 

1.  Consider The Dress Code

When wearing pink shorts in a “dressier” situation, you’ll want to stick to neutral-colored shirts (i.e white, black, or grey). 

Notice how I put “dressier” in inverted commas. Ultimately, shorts should never be considered formal. But when worn with the right style and color of shirt, pink shorts can be worn in smart-casual settings. 

If you’re going full casual, you could pull off shirts in brighter and more vibrant colors if you wanted to. You’ll see a range of all of these in the combinations below. 

It’s worth mentioning that the dress code should also influence the style of shirt you choose to wear with the pink shorts. 

• Casual – T-shirts, tank tops. 
• Smart-Casual – Polo shirts, linen shirts, OCBD shirts

When it comes to color-matching with pink shorts, it doesn’t matter what style of shirt you’ve gone for. The same principles will apply and the same color combos will work. 

2. Neutral Or Muted Shirts Are Always Easiest

While you could go for a vibrant, bright, and bold-colored shirt when dressing ultra-casual, neutral and muted shirts will always be easiest. 

At the end of the day, the color pink is already pretty in-your-face. 

It’s usually best to have the pink shorts be the one “pop” of color in your outfit and to stick to neutral, muted items for the rest. 

This doesn’t mean you’re restricted to white, grey, or black shirts. 

It just means that if you do go for a colored shirt, you should consider choosing an especially muted one. 

For example, instead of a fluorescent lime green shirt, consider an olive or sage green shirt instead. 

3. The Color Wheel Can Help 

The color wheel is a useful tool but needs to be used the right way. 

It shows the relationship between non-neutral colors. You’ve got warm colors on one half and cool colors on the other half. 

Pink is very much a “warm” color. 

When choosing a shirt color to go with it, you’ve got a few options: 

• A neutral color (white, grey, or black) that doesn’t appear on the color wheel. This is the easiest option. 
• Another warm color (red, orange, yellow). Mixing warm colors with other warm colors can be pretty vibrant, attention-grabbing, and summer-friendly. 
• A cool-colored shirt (blue, green, or purple). Mixing warm colors with cool colors is high-contrast and can work well. The more contrast you’ve got, the less subtle the combination will appear. 

Ultimately, if you want to go for a non-neutral-colored shirt when wearing pink shorts, try to choose a muted shade of one of those colors to prevent the entire outfit from looking excessively flamboyant. 

Pink Shorts And Shirt Combinations

You’ve got a whole bunch of options, but some may be better suited to your preferences or to the setting you’re dressing for. 

Remember, these color combinations would work no matter what style of shirt you’ve gone for – whether it’s a T-shirt, polo, linen shirt, or anything else. 

Here’s a list of the shirt colors that would potentially work well with pink shorts: 

• Pink 
• White
• Grey
• Black
• Maroon 
• Blue
• Green

Let’s go through them. 

Pink Shorts With A Pink Shirt

A pink shorts and pink shirt combination is “monochromatic” – it consists of multiple items of the same color. 

However, choosing a shirt in exactly the same shade of pink as the shorts would be a mistake. It would usually look awkward and out of place. 

A much better option would be to choose a shirt and pair of shorts in very different shades of pink. 

For example, a dark pink pair of shorts with a light pink shirt. 

The contrast would allow you to easily distinguish the two shades from each other, while still giving you the benefits of a monochromatic outfit. 

The main benefit would be just how easy it is to coordinate. It requires very little thought. 

Pink will go well with pink, but it really helps when the shades of pink are very different from each other. 

Pink Shorts With A White, Grey, Or Black Shirt

Pink shorts can easily be worn with a white, grey, or black shirt to practically any casual or smart-casual setting you can think of. 

That goes for T-shirts, polos, linen shirts, etc. 

It’ll just work, simply because of how neutral those shirt colors are. 

Wearing a neutral-colored shirt would take the thinking out of color coordination. 

You won’t have to worry about whether your color combination is too vibrant, too “out there”, or too in-your-face. 

It’ll always be subtle, stylish, and easy to coordinate with other items. 

Here, you’re letting the pink shorts be the one “pop” of color in the outfit, without letting too many other vibrant colors into the mix. 

This is always a safe play, simply because too many vibrant colors can conflict with each other or simply become too much. 

Pink Shorts With Maroon Or Burn Orange Shirt

When wearing pink shorts with shirts in other “warm” colors, there’s always a risk of the outfit becoming too much. 

It can work, but it needs to be done the right way. 

The more subtle and muted the shade of the shirt is, the better. 

Referring back to the color wheel, the warm colors you’ve got to work with are reds, oranges, and yellows. 

Sure, you could go for a bright scarlet red polo and pair it with the pink shorts, but the result would probably be a little too much color. 

You don’t want to stand out from a crowd too much. 

Instead, consider going for a maroon or burnt orange polo. They’re dark, muted, and subtle. 

Pink Shorts With A Blue Shirt

Pink shorts can be worn with blue shirts, with light and muted shades of blue working especially well. 

The mixture of a warm color (pink) and cool color (blue) is high contrast but often looks great. 

In fact, it often has a more subtle appearance to it than mixing pink shorts with other warm colors (as per the previous section). 

Light blue long-sleeved shirts look fantastic when worn with pink shorts to the dressier smart-casual settings you may be attending. 

Think OCBDs and linen shirts. 

The combination looks even better when paired with appropriate summer-friendly footwear. 

Think boat shoes, loafers, or espadrilles. 

Overall, the pink shorts and blue shirt ensemble will work no matter what style you go for. 

But if you were looking for a dressier option that didn’t rely on neutral shirt colors, a light blue shirt would be a very reasonable and effective alternative. 

Pink Shorts With A Green Shirt

A green shirt can work well with pink shorts but does produce a high-contrast look. Consider choosing a muted shade of green such as mint, olive, or sage green to prevent the combination from looking too attention-grabbing. 

Green and red are complementary colors – they lie directly opposite each other on the color wheel. 

Pink is a light shade of red, so the color complementary to it on the color wheel would be a light shade of green. 

Complementary colors work well together but do produce a high degree of contrast. 

While this may sound appealing, it’s often best to go muted whenever you can. 

Avoid the lime green or chartreuse shirt and go for something more subtle. Olive green and sage green are common favorites. 

However, if you wanted a darker alternative you could consider hunter green or forest green instead. 

Conclusion 

Pink shorts can be worn with a wide range of shirt colors, but some will definitely be more suitable than others in any given setting. 

The one you choose does depend on the dress code, as well as how much contrast you want between the vibrant pink shorts and the shirt itself. 

Enjoy.