Skittles Rainbow Experiment

This easy to do, cost effective and extremely fun and exciting Skittles Rainbow Experiment is a fun science experiment for children to complete, providing lots of opportunities for investigation as well.

Skittles Rainbow Experiment

This cool science experiment is so much fun! Kids will enjoy creating a lovely rainbow with some of their delicious candy. This is a great experiment to complete, especially when children receive lots of candy during different events throughout the year. 

To create a bright, colourful rainbow, you will need:

• a white plate or bowl
• skittles
• warm water
• Skittle Experiment Worksheets

Skittles Rainbow Experiment Instructions

To create a colourful rainbow, you will first need to place your white bowl or plate somewhere flat where it will not get bumped or disturbed.

If using the experiment worksheets, print out a copy of them for each child. There are a couple of different worksheets to choose from, depending on the age of your children, so choose the best one for them.

Then, place the skittles onto the plate or in the bowl, alternating the colours as you go.

You can get as creative as you want with the pattern that you place the skittles in. You can also use the colours you want, be it two, three or five different colours, it is all up to you.

Gently begin pouring around an inch of water in the middle of the plate until it reaches all of the candies, and just barely covers them.

Watch what happens!

Keep watching and see if anything changes, depending on the length of time you leave it be.

Why Do the Colours Spread?

As you probably already know, skittles are coated in sugar and food colouring/dye, so when you pour water on the skittles, this coating dissolves and spreads. The sugar and food colouring/dye dissolve into the water and then spread through the water, turning it into the colour of the skittle that it comes from.

Why Don’t The Colours Mix?

It has to do with water stratification. The sugar and food colouring/dye that dissolves into the water and spreads has different masses with different properties that create a barrier, causing the different colours not to mix.

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Learn More

What other ways could you complete this experiment? 

• Try using water of different temperatures such as cold, warm and hot
• Try using white vinegar or soft drink such as lemonade instead of water
• Try using different candies and see if they work the same
• Is there any way you could speed up or slow down this process?
• What happens to the ‘s’ on the skittles?
• Anything else that you can think of?

Dissolving candy is such a fun experiment for children to complete. Why try these other fun and exciting experiments – dissolving candy canes experiment or even this gummy bear experiment.