How to Change Colors in Crochet

Why does the color change happen one stitch early?

The top of a crochet stitch is made by the final yarn over, and that top is the part you see as the next row's base. So the last pull-through of a stitch actually belongs, visually, to the stitch that follows it.

Change color at the start of the new stitch instead and you get a small stub of the old color sitting on top of the new one. It reads as a jagged edge along the color line.

Once this clicks it applies everywhere. Single crochet, double crochet, or a decrease, the rule is always the same: switch on the last yarn over of the stitch before.

How do you change color at the end of a row?

This is the most common case, used for stripes. The change belongs to the last stitch of the old row, before you turn.

Leave a tail of at least six inches on both yarns. Short tails work loose and undo themselves after a wash.

1. Work the final stitch of the row until two loops remain on the hook.
2. Drop the old color to the back of the work.
3. Pick up the new color, leaving a six inch tail, and yarn over with it.
4. Pull the new color through both loops. The loop on your hook is now the new color.
5. Chain and turn as the pattern says. The whole next row starts clean.

How do you change color in the middle of a row?

Same rule, with one addition: you have to decide what happens to the yarn you are not using.

If you will come back to the old color within a few stitches, carry it along the top of the row and work over it. The stitches hide it and there are no extra tails. This is how most simple colorwork and tapestry crochet is done.

If the old color is finished for a long stretch, drop it and pick up a separate ball on the other side instead. Carrying a yarn behind twenty stitches pulls the fabric tight and shows through pale colors. That is the same reason intarsia uses a separate bobbin per block.

What do you do with the yarn tails?

Weave them in with a yarn needle, following the direction of the stitches rather than cutting across them. Go about two inches one way, then reverse and go back an inch in a different path. The change of direction is what locks it.

Do not knot the two colors together. A knot creates a hard lump you can feel through the fabric, and it eventually works its way to the front of the work.

Weave as you go rather than saving them all. A striped blanket with forty color changes is eighty tails, and nobody has ever enjoyed that evening.

How do you plan stripes so you do not run out?

Work out how much yarn one stripe takes, then multiply. Weigh your yarn before a stripe and again after, and you have the grams per stripe for that exact width.

Even stripes are easier to plan but easy to get wrong at the end. Count how many stripes fit your intended length before you start, rather than discovering at row 180 that you have one blue stripe left and two more rows to fill.

Keep a note of which color you are on and which round the change falls on, especially for a repeating sequence. A counter that tracks the row and a separate counter for the repeat handles this without arithmetic, which is exactly the sort of thing Worsted's linked counters were built for.