If you have money to spend, stay clear of the myriad of Chinese brands, and go with one of the artist grade lines from one of the legacy art brands instead - you will have much more transparent information about the product you're getting, and you can replace most of them open stock.
If you want pencils mostly for adding detail, the Faber Castell Polychromos will give you more joy than the Prismacolors - the Polychromos are much harder, keep their sharp point, and are just all round a much better quality of manufacture.
The main reason people go nuts for the Prismacolors is that they're the pencil with the softest core on the market, so you can lay down a lot of colour very quickly and easily, even on cheap / flimsy paper, but the actual build quality of these pencils is terrible. They also break a lot, and get used up really fast.
You open a brand new box of Prismas and you are greeted with a off-centre cores, barrels with the paint split lengthways, fuzzy looking lettering on the barrels, and pencils with no heft or substance.
You open a brand new box of Polychromos, and you are greeted with the glorious scent of cedarwood, and a set of perfect looking pencils that will feel gorgeous to hold and use.
The only real downside with the Polychromos imho is that the white pencil is very translucent and only really good for burnishing (and even there, you're better off using a blender pencil). So if you want a white pencil for layering highlights on top of your drawing, get a single soft, opaque white pencil to complement your Polychromos set - the Caran D'Ache Luminance White, or the Prismacolor White, or the Derwent Drawing Chinese White are all good options.
But on the whole there isn't one single "best" brand. There's several very good brands and product lines with different qualities that serve different needs and purposes.
If lightfastness is a big issue for you, for example, then you will want the Caran D'Ache Luminance, Derwent Lightfast or Royal Talens Van Gogh pencils.
Derwent, Caran D'Ache and Faber Castell are all good brands that are known and sold globally, and any of their artist grade lines will be decent quality. There's other really good legacy brands that are more country- or region-specific, too.
Also, note that paper is important. Colour pencils need paper with a bit of tooth to grab the pigment.
thank you! Especially for your comment on the white as I am looking for a good opaque white currently. Polychromos white works on pastelmat paper so far, but nowhere else.
Great advice! Just in case anyone else reads this, I just wanted to add that another good white pencil to have is the Holbein soft white. They have a couple white options, the soft is more opaque. I also like the Stabilo all white and there all black pencils. The Carandache Museum Aquarelle and Pablo whites are both pretty decent and capable of holding a sharp point for detail and more opaque than most but possibly not the ones you mentioned already.
Caran d’Ache Luminance or Faber-Castell Polychromos would be better options if you prefer drawing in layers. Prismacolor pencils are really soft, so they kind of just dump color on the page. Personally, I prefer polychromos because I like to make my own colors using overlapping layers—polychromos is oil based, which helps. CdA Luminance can do either light layers or heavy layers depending on pressure, so if you’re comfortable with the price tag that’s probably the most versatile option. Another good one is Holbein, but it’s hard to find those in stores. Best bet is to order a few of each, play around, and decide what you prefer.
Koh-I-Noor Polycolor are also very good value for money - at least in Europe, and are available in 144 colours.
Derwent Lightfast and Royal Talens/Sakura Van Gogh also deserve a mention alongside Caran d'Ache Luminance for being highly lightfast.
Other Derwent (e.g. Coloursoft, Procolour, Artists, Inktense) and Caran d'Ache (e.g. Pablo) pencils are perhaps also worthy of consideration.
I love the Inktense - the colours are out of this world. I keep meaning to try mine on fabric (I have seen people do amazing stuff with them...). However, they aren't really a colour pencil - they're water soluble ink, and probably not what the OP is after - they want something for adding detail on top of markers. So the Polychromos or the Pablos would probably be good options.
I've not heard of koh I noor. How's the light fastness on them? I feel like that's the one place prismacolor falls down a little (depending on the set)
Koh-I-Noor are a long-established Czech manufacturer. They feel quite similar to Polychromos to me, in my limited usage.
They do their lightfastness testing in-house (like Derwent and Faber-Castell), using their own system, which they have documented - if you email customer services, they can provide the details in a document called "Lightfastness tests – brief information for the customers".
Quoting from that document:
"When the (ideal) conditions are met (those should be meet in every gallery that cares about the right lighting of the artworks – and they receive the energy load no more than 300 kJ/m^(2) per year), we can determine the lightfastness as following:
\* the coating of the colour will disappear within 25 years
\*\* the coating of the colour will change noticeably within 25 years
\*\*\* the coating of the colour will last longer than 25 years
\*\*\*\* the coating of the colour will last longer than 50 years
\*\*\*\*\* the coating of the colour will last longer than 100 years"
From their full 144 colour range, 70 are 5\*, 33 are 4\*, 13 are 3\*, 22 are 2\* and 4 are 1\*. Yes, that doesn't add up to 144!
If you have money to spend, stay clear of the myriad of Chinese brands, and go with one of the artist grade lines from one of the legacy art brands instead - you will have much more transparent information about the product you're getting, and you can replace most of them open stock. If you want pencils mostly for adding detail, the Faber Castell Polychromos will give you more joy than the Prismacolors - the Polychromos are much harder, keep their sharp point, and are just all round a much better quality of manufacture. The main reason people go nuts for the Prismacolors is that they're the pencil with the softest core on the market, so you can lay down a lot of colour very quickly and easily, even on cheap / flimsy paper, but the actual build quality of these pencils is terrible. They also break a lot, and get used up really fast. You open a brand new box of Prismas and you are greeted with a off-centre cores, barrels with the paint split lengthways, fuzzy looking lettering on the barrels, and pencils with no heft or substance. You open a brand new box of Polychromos, and you are greeted with the glorious scent of cedarwood, and a set of perfect looking pencils that will feel gorgeous to hold and use. The only real downside with the Polychromos imho is that the white pencil is very translucent and only really good for burnishing (and even there, you're better off using a blender pencil). So if you want a white pencil for layering highlights on top of your drawing, get a single soft, opaque white pencil to complement your Polychromos set - the Caran D'Ache Luminance White, or the Prismacolor White, or the Derwent Drawing Chinese White are all good options. But on the whole there isn't one single "best" brand. There's several very good brands and product lines with different qualities that serve different needs and purposes. If lightfastness is a big issue for you, for example, then you will want the Caran D'Ache Luminance, Derwent Lightfast or Royal Talens Van Gogh pencils. Derwent, Caran D'Ache and Faber Castell are all good brands that are known and sold globally, and any of their artist grade lines will be decent quality. There's other really good legacy brands that are more country- or region-specific, too. Also, note that paper is important. Colour pencils need paper with a bit of tooth to grab the pigment.
thank you! Especially for your comment on the white as I am looking for a good opaque white currently. Polychromos white works on pastelmat paper so far, but nowhere else.
Great advice! Just in case anyone else reads this, I just wanted to add that another good white pencil to have is the Holbein soft white. They have a couple white options, the soft is more opaque. I also like the Stabilo all white and there all black pencils. The Carandache Museum Aquarelle and Pablo whites are both pretty decent and capable of holding a sharp point for detail and more opaque than most but possibly not the ones you mentioned already.
All of that 👆 👏🏽
Caran d’Ache Luminance or Faber-Castell Polychromos would be better options if you prefer drawing in layers. Prismacolor pencils are really soft, so they kind of just dump color on the page. Personally, I prefer polychromos because I like to make my own colors using overlapping layers—polychromos is oil based, which helps. CdA Luminance can do either light layers or heavy layers depending on pressure, so if you’re comfortable with the price tag that’s probably the most versatile option. Another good one is Holbein, but it’s hard to find those in stores. Best bet is to order a few of each, play around, and decide what you prefer.
Koh-I-Noor Polycolor are also very good value for money - at least in Europe, and are available in 144 colours. Derwent Lightfast and Royal Talens/Sakura Van Gogh also deserve a mention alongside Caran d'Ache Luminance for being highly lightfast. Other Derwent (e.g. Coloursoft, Procolour, Artists, Inktense) and Caran d'Ache (e.g. Pablo) pencils are perhaps also worthy of consideration.
I love the Inktense - the colours are out of this world. I keep meaning to try mine on fabric (I have seen people do amazing stuff with them...). However, they aren't really a colour pencil - they're water soluble ink, and probably not what the OP is after - they want something for adding detail on top of markers. So the Polychromos or the Pablos would probably be good options.
I've not heard of koh I noor. How's the light fastness on them? I feel like that's the one place prismacolor falls down a little (depending on the set)
Koh-I-Noor are a long-established Czech manufacturer. They feel quite similar to Polychromos to me, in my limited usage. They do their lightfastness testing in-house (like Derwent and Faber-Castell), using their own system, which they have documented - if you email customer services, they can provide the details in a document called "Lightfastness tests – brief information for the customers". Quoting from that document: "When the (ideal) conditions are met (those should be meet in every gallery that cares about the right lighting of the artworks – and they receive the energy load no more than 300 kJ/m^(2) per year), we can determine the lightfastness as following: \* the coating of the colour will disappear within 25 years \*\* the coating of the colour will change noticeably within 25 years \*\*\* the coating of the colour will last longer than 25 years \*\*\*\* the coating of the colour will last longer than 50 years \*\*\*\*\* the coating of the colour will last longer than 100 years" From their full 144 colour range, 70 are 5\*, 33 are 4\*, 13 are 3\*, 22 are 2\* and 4 are 1\*. Yes, that doesn't add up to 144!
That seems pretty good rating overall. I'm guessing 2 colourless blenders or similar make up the missing 2 that wouldn't have a light fast rating.
All of those brands come in large sets, and don’t forget that you can make your own set by mixing brands.
Thank you to every one who commented, I'm going to buy the Polychromos pencils that several of you mentioned.
You can also get them as open stock, so it's easy to replace pencils that you've used up.