| Black: | The horse's coat, mane, and tail are black. |
| Brown: | The horse's coat, mane, and tail are brown. The color may be nearly black, or lighter. Very dark seal brown may be distinguished from black by looking at the muzzle. If there are brown hairs here, the horse is brown. |
| Bay: | The horse's coat is reddish brown. The mane and tail are black, as are the horse's legs. Bay horses are said to have black points, and these are the legs, mane, tail, points of the ears, and the muzzle. |
| Chestnut: | The horse's coat is a shade of red. The mane and tail are also chestnut, and may be the same shade as the coat, lighter that the coat (flaxen) or darker than the coat, but NEVER BLACK. (If he had a black mane and tail then he'd be a bay). |
| White: | The horse is entirely white, with pink skin. If he has dark skin, he isn't white, he's gray. |
| gray: | a progressive silvering after birth. The horse is born one of the other colors and then goes from dark gray to almost white with age. The color may change at various rates depending on the individual. |
| roan: | white hairs are mixed with hairs of any other color. Roan on bay is red roan, roan on black is blue roan, and roan on chestnut is strawberry roan. |
| dominant white: | an absence of pigment which causes the fifth basic coat color, white. |
| Grulla: | a dilution of black |
| Buckskin: | a single dilution of bay |
| Perlino: | a double dilution of bay |
| Palomino: | a single dilution of chestnut (three shades lighter or darker than a newly minted gold coin). |
| Cremello: | a double dilution of chestnut |
| piebald: | black with white spots, or vice versa |
| skewbald: | white with any other color |
| pinto: | large spots (includes tobiano and overo) |
| tobiano: | color on white (white extends over the back) |
| overo: | white on color (white does not cross over the top line) |
| appaloosa: | small spots (includes leopard, blanket, snowflake, and roan with appy markings) *see Breed notes, appaloosa |
| star: | white marking approximately between the eyes |
| snip: | white marking on the nose |
| stripe: | narrow band of white running down the face |
| blaze: | white extends almost to the eyes, but not past |
| bald face: | white extends past the eyes |
