Guinea pigs come in all shapes and sizes, and even colors! Guinea pigs are diverse, and each and every one of them can be unique in their own little ways.
If you’d like to read more about the different breeds of guinea pigs, check out our guinea pig breed master list. It gives a general overview of each of the recognized breeds, and then links to our individual posts on each of them!
There are different colors of guinea pig fur, and then they expand into different coat patterns!
The most common guinea pig colors
Beige guinea pigs are one of the lighter colors and are often described as a lighter brown with a golden tone to them. Cream guinea pigs are similar to beige, but are much lighter. On the opposite end of the color spectrum, guinea pigs can also be black or brown in color, and sometimes they can both be mistaken for each other. Black-colored guinea pigs can sometimes be bluish in tone too, which looks super cool!
Sometimes guinea pigs even come in a reddish-brown tone, but are referred to as red! Gold guinea pigs have a similar tone to beige and cream guinea pigs, they’re just a warmer-looking color. One super cool color that guinea pigs come in is lilac! They look gray, but sometimes you can detect other colors when you’re examining their hair!
Guinea pig coat patterns
Agouti
These piggies have very distinct looks to them, as their coats look flecked and speckled in different colors. This pattern usually has two colors throughout their fur, and their belly is usually one color. Sometimes even the fur around their eyes sticks to one color.
This type of pattern is actually not that common, so you won’t always find guinea pigs with this kind of coat! Usually the two colors that are found in agouti patterns are ones that contrast, and the flecks don’t usually blend into the main color.
Argente
This coat pattern is very similar to the Agouti pattern, but the flecks of color are a little different. They have different speckles of color, but they occur on each individual hair, which is super cool to look at! They also usually only come in a small group of lighter colors.
Bi-color
Bi-colors, as the name suggests, have two colors distributed in splotches across their body and are pretty distinct. There’s no limitation to what colors this pattern can come in, however there is a name for the ones that involve black and red! This particular pattern is called Tortoiseshell.
Usually in this pattern, the patches of color are solid and there isn’t much overlap. Each little patch is what you could call clean-cut. The splotches are often placed on either side of their back and avoid the center.
Brindle
Brindle guinea pigs are similar to Tortoiseshell-patterned piggies because of the colors that show up, but have distributed colors rather than clean patches of color.
In particular, these guinea pigs that have the pattern have quite glossy fur!
Dalmatian
As you may have guessed from the Dalmatian dog breed, the name of this guinea pig coat is because of the same kind of scattered splotches of color, and especially on their faces. They pretty much always have a white streak down the center of their faces and their feet are colored too!
Breeding guinea pigs for the dalmatian coat pattern is discouraged because it can cause disfigurement in the piggies.
Dutch
These piggies have highly-identifiable coats with a white chest and front legs, while the colors on the rest of their body are different. Most of these guinea pigs have white on their faces. The hair on their feet tends to be quite fine, and overall their coat is glossy!
Fox
These guinea pigs are similar to those with the Self piggies, but with the areas that have colors. These piggies have a pale area around the eyes, chest, and stomach, with white flecks in spots around their bodies.
Himalayan
These guinea pigs are of the albino type, with white hair and red eyes! These come in two shades, black and chocolate, with bright white hair. They don’t have a gradual transition from the white hair to their darker colored areas, but are pretty distinctly sectioned out.
Roan
These piggies are usually two colors without patches. Instead, the white hairs are mixed into the main, dominant color. This pattern usually is on the body, but doesn’t show up on the face. These piggies can come in different colors and coat types!
Roans have a gene that causes health problems in the babies, and should only be mated with other coat-types to avoid the gene.
Self
Self guinea pigs are single-colored guinea pigs and are very common! There are twelve different possible colors, which include black, cream, black, chocolate and lilac. They usually have smooth coats.
Tan
The tan guinea pigs have a single base color, with some tan patches! These patches are usually located around the eyes, the muzzle, belly, and sometimes next to the ears.
Tortoise and White
This coat is pretty popular, and is super cool to look at. They usually have three colors: red, white, and black. These kinds of coats have very distinct sections of these colors with little intermixing.
Tricolor
These guinea pigs have patches consisting of three different colors. These sections don’t really overlap, and don’t have a lot of brindling!
Guinea pigs are diverse!
Their colors are so fun and always so different, and with the different types of hair, they’re also super unique looking. For more information on the different breeds, check out this post.
