20 Best Wood For Dark Stain (2023 Updated)

I’ve had a can of the Kona stain forever and have used it on many projects. The color is deep and rich. Always do a test spot first because, depending on the wood, the color will come out different, always beautiful, but differ000000000ent.

It’s easy to use and I’ve never had streaking or splotching with it. It is oil-based so I always use disposable tools or simply wipe it on with a blue paper shop towel. Once top-coated with poly, it looks utterly amazing.

I went against everything in my brain telling me not to buy a stain online. wow did it pay off! This stain is amazing! It absolutely coats in 1 coat and leaves a really rich grey color behind, I used a rag to rub some of it off so it was a bit more rustic, however I love the stain either way! Great product!.

Love the product. Applies so easy. I use it on my farm wood signs to stain It is washable. I don’t not apply a coating after. My sign has been outside all last winter and this summer. Looks as good as it was first done.

The key to success with this project was a deep cleaning of my kitchen and bathroom cabinets. Simply use the product as instructed on package, wipe in the direction of grain, use a foam brush to remove excess in corners where it gathered.

Go over worn areas until you have a uniformed appearance. Product dried to a deep rich natural satin finish that added years to their life. Hardly any mess to clean up and only a few hours from start to finish.

Saved thousands over having professionally refinished or replaced. Saved extra sheets in a pickle jar for touch ups if needed in the future. $20 for 2 packages of product , a little masking tape, a few extra pairs of throw away gloves,an old toothbrush and some 200 grit sandpaper.

If you want new cabinets this isnt for you, if you want to clean up a eye sore for practically nothing. Its a no brained. good luck.

This stuff is amazingly simple to use and even more amazingly effective. I didn’t sand or anything. Just wiped a lot until it wasn’t smudged and let set. Took 2 coats which was about 15 min if work at hour wait in between coatsto make my old end tables look brand-new and with no experience no tools no talent no knowledge and practically no time sweat free and I went and had lunch in between and everyone thought id spent the better majority of the day making those things beautiful.

It’s as simple as a princess kissing a frog. No frog tho just wood furniture.

These got the job done but once you open the bag be ready to use the contents because you are unlikely to be able to preserve the cloths and be sure to have lots of plastic gloves on hand along with those included in the bag.

It did cover the wood and looks very nice but is best used on unfinished surfaces. Having to use it on the porch of an apartment; i. e. with no garage or specific work area, made it more difficult for my situation but, again, it did work and left a nice finish.

It’s also an advantage that it is not oil based so soap and water clean-up was easy.

Excellent product! Very nice colour! Popular option with my wood furniture customers. Goes on very easily and very forgiving, with no lines. Has an odour to it but nothing compared to regular toxic stains.

No skull and cross bone. Dry to the touch in no time! One coat is pretty light. I usually do two coats to get a darker look.

I ordered this stain because I already had a bottle of it but was pretty sure I didn’t have enough to finish the job. I searched a long time to find one in the same bottle with the same label–to be certain I was getting the same product.

I was thrilled to find it here. Oops–wrong! Different label AND it shipped from Amazon–not Walmart. The seller also had super poor customer service.

I’m not sure who decided to add “odourless” to this product description but it would only be possible if you’ve entirely lost your sense of smell. While the coverage was decent. Plan on using this stain outdoors or in a well ventilated space.

For a few more dollars you can buy a whole can of wood stain, I bought it for the less mess then using a brush but it’s not worth it. The bottle is hard to squeeze and a brush has way better results.

Don’t waste your money on this. I had bought two bottles and ended up returning one.

This varnish works well! It was a little lighter than I anticipated. It was less brown and much more grey than the sample picture in the store. But overall, I like the applicator and I’ve used it a couple of times on some small projects.

Super easy to use. The only downside is the limited color selection. I love how mess-free these are. Great for small projects.

I used this Saman stain on a poplar picture frame with no pre-conditioning. There was no splotching and cleanup was as simple as soap and water. I will make about 20 such picture frames over the next month or so and present them to elementary and middle school tutorial students who will stain and finish them.

I applied the stain with a bristle brush and wiped off the excess. I didn’t wear gloves. I have purchased several Saman stain colors and have prepared a color board with those colors for the students to choose.

Used as directed, this provides a transparent-ish coloring that allows the grain of the wood to show through. I used Tried & True Original Wood Finish over the Saman’s #102 and was very pleased with the colored-but-still-natural look.

Another piece I tried was hard rock maple and this stain did not soak in very well. What I was told by a local woodworking guru was that I was trying to “dye” the maple and maple doesn’t dye—stop that.

Apparently, there are paint stains that work better for very hard woods by “coating” more and “soaking” less. For general purposes, the Saman line provides very interesting colors, easy application and clean up.

Go for it!.

I just bought this. According to the name “Red Mahogany” the visual representation on the packaging and the colour of my desk the marker should have been at least close. When applied what appeared was closer to very dark brown almost black.

I pretested on paper and three different kinds of wood. All results were some degree of very dark brown so not close to Red Mahogany. It is a good thing that the spot I touched up was small. I am not impressed with this product at all.

When I used to deliver/install office spaces the cheap touch-up markers used were far superior. I honestly cannot see how this would work for touch-up of any Red Mahogany surface unless for a very minor scratch where a minute amount/coat is needed therefore the colour of this product is not a real factor.

Minwax® Wood Finish™ Stain Marker is awesome. I needed something to get rid of scratches and scruffs on my furniture, cabinets, table, etc. I got this Miniwax Wood Marker to see if it would fix my issues.

It looks like a marker. The color tip also is like a marker. Once out of the packet I shook it a few times and pushed down on the marker tip to get the color flowing. Try not to do it to hard as I’m sure you can mess up the top easily.

The color flowed down pretty quick. Its actually darker than the what the picture shows on the package. Kinda surprised. I decided to touch up a small area on my cabinet corner even though my cabinet seemed lighter colored then the marker.

Figured I can do a small spot. The color was a pretty good match. It was easily to color in the spot. I did use my finger to smudge the color in a bit. Dried quick. Not sure if I’ll retouch it up but seems to look ok.

The only con I had was when I was shaking the marker the tip came off. But luckily I was able to put it back in and it stayed on during the process. Not sure how long it will last to stay in the marker but I’m hoping to get a good amount of uses out of the marker.

Love it!.

I didn’t have high hopes for this pen because they typically look very obvious after application. This one actually worked amazingly well, but make sure to pay close attention to the coloring. The color i got went on a bit on the darker side, but I just let it sit and soak for a few minutes and took a soft cloth (one you don’t care about) and kind of buffed the area to blend and slightly lighten the color.

For small scratches, grudges, and nicks- this was fantastic! You couldn’t tell you had used something like this for it’s repair, by any means. Also it’s worth noting that letting it dry for awhile is a good idea! With a larger area you may be able to tell a bit more but the cloth buffing also worked wonders.

I would recommend!.

Not a very consistent product on its own. Medium to larger projects require additives, but are sold separately. Sometimes the project comes out great the first shot, sometimes it takes a redo or two.

I see other reviewers that had the same issue even with extender. Oil based stains work far better and don’t require all the fancy additives to get a consistently good and even stain. I’ve been on the fence with this stain.

Smaller projects it can be flawless. Larger projects. I have to say the Lord’s Prayer, Hail Mary, and all kinds of prayers in hopes that it works 😅Sooooo back to oil based stains!.

So this review is not a dig on general finishes. They make great products. Some I swear by. This is not one of them. On bare oak, especially right angles and raised panel doors, almost impossible to get great results which are automatic with oil based.

Raises the grain, dries so fast you have no time to work it out without streaks and blotches. Also does not penetrate worth a dam and leaves very slight grain marks that did not take the stain. I’m an experienced wood worker and have always used oil based stain with stellar results.

After this project is done, I will never use water based again. I’ll deal with the odor and extra time to get good results. Woodwork is a labor of love and worth some extra time.

This stuff was infuriating because its not like oil based where you wipe it on and then wipe it off and have all the time in the world. I tried doing a 36″x47″ panel with this and first i tried hand applying then wipe off and it was already dry so i had no time to wipe off.

Failed. Then i tried spraying from my Fuji Q5 to increase speed and wipe off, again dried too fast and failed. 3rd test i did was fhe magic ticket. Spray it on thin but coat it all and DONT TOUCH IT, and it turns out fantastic, although very dark.

So the key with this stuff is dont listen to can instructions and basically treat it like paint.

Redwood semi-transparent oil-based stain: before and after pictures. This playset was coated twice and used 4 gallons out of a five gallon bucket. The stain is oily and wipes off metal easily; not as easy off of plastic.

The five gallons was well mixed. No noticeable separation or layering of the stain when first opened. It was still stirred before application though. Brushes, rollers, and pads were used. This stain would work well in a sprayer.

This stain seems less viscous than a solid stain. Imperfections in the wood show through this stain. The second coat gave it a consistant appearance overall. Light colored wood filler will show through this stain no matter how many coats are applied.

I would use this again only on wood that has a consistent (previously stained or bare wood) color at the start of the stain application. Power washing marks will show through this stain even with two applications.

Surfaces remained oily to the touch for many hours after the second coat was applied. Unsure how long the color will last. Good price for decent stain. 4 stars overall. This site states that the pictures were too big to upload.

I stained both sides of a more than 300 foot, four foot high cedar fence, and I could not be happier with the results. The stain was very forgiving, easy to apply, and has a uniform color despite some inconsistent application on my part.

It also dried quickly holding up to a storm 16 hours after the project was completed. I did power wash several days prior, and it being a two year old fence, I had dry wood to work with when I applied the stain.

It did come out a bit darker than the image on the can shows, though part of that is certainly from the fence being cedar to begin with, and the end product is a wonderfully rich color. This was comparatively inexpensive to other brands I considered.

Highly recommend.

It is my first time using this product. I have years of experience with oil based stains and am very comfortable using them and mixing them to get the color I want. With this water-based dye, I had a rather difficult time getting the mixture I was looking for.

Kept getting a really washed out result, even after watching several “You Tube” videos. Happened to be in Grand Rapids, MI on business and saw a Woodcraft store, where I was able to pick up some pre-mixed dye-stain in the color I needed by General Finishes that worked very nicely.

When I have time I hope to play around with the four tints that I have to see how I can get acceptable results. The down side to that is the expense of the trial and error method. At $21. 00 an ounce, pouring an undesired mix down the drain looses its appeal quite rapidly.

This stain is very easy to apply and this is why I like it. Use a rag to apply light coats and away you go. I find oil based stains bring grain patterns out very nicely. The look is striking but natural.

The price is good too.

I’ve used stain for years, and never had this many problems. Applied one, extremely thin coat and wiped it off as the instructions said. After 24 hours it is still not dry. Was told by customer support that that was normal because I had to wipe it down with paint thinner, then reapply again to get the desired color.

Nowhere on the can does it state this. Then got their color matched wood putty that says right on the label that it is for nail holes. Put it in a test hole, and in 3 days, it’s as tacky as the day I put it in.

Read the tiny writing on the back and found where it says “non hardening”. I can’t even wrap my head around why you’d even make a product that does not harden. Finally bout a “paintable stainable” wood filler.

To their credit, it sands easily and beautifully uniform if you plan on painting over it. However , it is not stainable as they claim. I put a drop of their darkest stains directly on it, and it still will not uptake the stain and what it does absorb does so in an ugly grainy way that stands out like a sore thumb.

I understand that every company has a doozy every now and again, but this is the worst collection of products I’ve ever used.

Every once and a while I find myself trying to apply a stain to a piece while also trying to maintain some semblance of natural color. Minwax has a few offerings I have tried. One is the Natural 209 wood finish; this is an oil stain with a slight red base.

No it won’t turn the piece red, but it does tip that direction as opposed to yellow. Boiled Linseed Oil is the opposite, providing a natural look with a hint of a yellow base. But when working with Minwax’s Tung oil, I have seen the best and most natural results on Maple, Sande, and Birch; both solid wood and plywood applications.

If you love the look of your unfinished project, Minwax Tung Oil is the best way to finish without losing the natural charm.

First things first, I love that there are so many color choices for this stain! It took me forever to decide betqeen a fun color or traditional stain, but in the end I went with Buckeye Brown. I also loved that it was low odor, so I could use it inside without irritating my mini pigs sensitive snout.

Minwax has a great tutorial on how to use this product on their Youtube channel, and i highly recommend checking it out before starting your project. I unfortunately could not find the Pre Stain conditioner that is recommended, it was sold out at the 2 locations I went to, and I feel like my results would have been a little better if I had used this before the stain.

This product IS thicker than I expected, and it is a bit messy, so just prepare your work area accordingly. I tested the stain on an extra piece of wood first so I knew how long to leave it on before wiping, and found that a minute and a half was just about right, and a synthetic pad worked better to wipe that a rag did.

Overall the process took longer than I was anticipating, but it turned out pretty well. Seriously do yourself a favor and watch the YouTube video, it really did help me to better prepare my project. I will definitely be purchasing this product in different colors for other projects in the future, cant wait to try the fun colors next!.

I used this product to stain a 6ft x 15in board that is part of a piece of furniture I built. The color was simply white, semi-transparent. I followed the directions to apply the stain with a high quality synthetic brush.

When I went to wipe off the excess with a clean rag as instructed (immediately, within 2 min), I found that the rag stuck to the product as I tried to wipe. This made the result extremely splotchy. I tried again on the other side of the wood, this time using a rag to wipe the stain on and off.

I got similarly terrible results. I stripped the splotchy stain off to start over, but before doing so I called Minwax to get some advice. After explaining what I was experiencing, the individual ended up suggesting that I try a damp rag to wipe off the excess instead of a dry one.

This did work a little better, but also removed most of the product. I decided to try something radical. I bought some plain Brillo sponges. I stirred the stain and then wiped some stain onto the sponge with the stirring stick to pre-wet it.

Then, I poured a stream of stain along the entire length of the board. I used the sponge to quickly spread the stain, and then made light passes across the board from end-to-end, with the grain, to gently smooth it out.

I held the sponge with both hands while doing this, being careful to minimize the amount of pressure applied. This technique gave me a pretty reasonable result. Minwax, please update the directions and provide a corresponding video to help people apply this product in a way that will actually work, considering this is an extremely thick and fast-drying stain.

So many people are wasting money, and worse a ton of time and effort trying to make this product work. It’s great to have such a wide variety of colors to choose from, but if people aren’t able to apply it then it becomes useless.

Have some compassion for all these poor folks. Thx!.

I would very much like to recount my original review on Ready Seal Stain company. When we started this project we ordered redwood after doing some further research on stain colors I found that alot of people ended up with orange tints when staining their fences and this is because of the wood that the fence was used to construct it.

Some woods in their state have a yellow his to them causing the outcome to look orange. After speaking with one of the reps at Ready Seal who suggested doing the second coat in mission brown to counter out the orange we found that it worked perfect.

It’s a but Darker than we originally wanted but the orange tint is gone. And the strain looks beautiful. Sorry Ready Seal you have our business for life.

I used Redwood to paint pine siding of my cabin. The product was very easy to apply with super stainer paint brush and clean after. Good coverage. Redwood color transformed the cabin beyond recognition while covering imperfections.

It simply looks beautiful. I got lots of complements from the neighbors. I’m a very happy customer.

This product appears to be fantastic! My deck has needed attention the last two summers, but Illinois weather has not cooperated. It’s been too rainy and the temperatures have been too high including the humidity levels.

Ready Seal defies those weather barriers! After stripping the previously used product from the deck and cleaning away the caustic residue, we waited two days for the deck to dry well. Application of Ready Seal went exceptionally well.

Amazingly no start-stop marks could be found. This product blended well with no extra work. We applied with both roller and brush. For such a large deck the product did an awesome job of coverage. After one coat the water repels so well – it’s like a new waxed car, the water just beads up on the wood.

This was the results after only six hours before another rain passed through the area! Looks like maintenance should be easy and a follow up application can be applied in temperatures of 35-90+ degrees.

I’m so glad I found this product. I will definitely be using it again!.

This stain is the best! You only really need apply it once and it dries very quickly. It’s got a pretty powerful smell, fumes, so I’d suggest to use it outdoors. I have purchased this stain for many projects around my home.

I highly recommend!!.

Good oil based stain. Can be thinned if needed. Flows well on wood and drywall.

Easy to use. Works well. Easy clean up.

I am thrilled with the Minwax Stain Marker. It is one of those things I’ve THOUGHT about needing, but never did. I’m so glad I’ve now tried it – and I’ve used it all over my house. First up was my wood closet system.

there were some dings and scratches from some years of use – PERFECT solution. Next were wood bedside tables who had some scratches on the top. much better now! Finally, there were a few small places on my laundry room wood floor.

worked well! Overall, I am really happy with the Stain Marker and imagine these will be something I keep on hand from now on. While it can’t FIX gouges or scratches, it can certainly make them WAY less noticeable.

This is the perfect little household tool to keep on hand for inevitable wear and tear on your hardwood surfaces. It’s also a great option to have when you have several different colors of wood in your home, like I do.

The marker contains the perfect amount for little touch-ups without taking up too much space. The product works well and is easy to use; the stain applies nicely and doesn’t make much of a mess at all.

Do make sure to store the marker sideways, as the instructions state, they are a little hard to get going again if you let them dry out.

This brought out the wood grain, nicely. It does have quite a strong smell, so if inside, open those windows. This was used around 9am and by nightfall we were able to close the windows.

I use this product for all of my wood work. I have done my window seals as well as my brand new doors. It is easy to work with and give the wood a little “je ne sais quoi” 🙂 One thing to keep in mind though, is that you will probably need several applications.

I would not recommend staining with this product when your object is vertical such as a door. Indeed, it can run off quite easily. That being said, if you are careful and/or vigilant you can easily remove any drop with a sponge (here I am assuming laminate/tile flooring.

I can’t speak for carpet). Finally, the finish. For a truly stunning finish, I would recommend using Danish oil once you are satisfied with the colour. Good luck.

Ordered a lot of testers for various brands as I was struggling to get the colour I was after. A lot of the time they didn’t come out as shown/advertised in photos, however this product did. I had multiple tester colours from littlefairs and they came out as they should of.

I’m currently in the middle of staining one of my wardbrobes in their moonlight grey stain and I’ll be using their products again to do the furniture in my spare room and each room there after. Top product, top quality and top price :-).

Great product. Easy to use and I am delighted with the transformation to my furniture. The enclosed instruction leaflet was very helpful and I followed the advised preparatory steps exactly.