Select the Paint Bucket tool. If it isn’t visible, select and hold the Gradient tool to access the hidden Paint Bucket tool.
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Fill adjacent areas with similar colors
Last updated on
Oct 28, 2025
Learn how to fill areas of your image with solid colors or patterns using the Paint Bucket tool in Adobe Photoshop.
The Paint Bucket tool lets you quickly fill areas with similar colors to your chosen foreground color or pattern. It intelligently detects color boundaries based on your tolerance settings. Use it to fill the background, add color to shapes, or fill the selections in an image.
Select a foreground or background color.
In the Options bar, select between the Foreground color or a Pattern. For Pattern, select one from the dropdown menu.
Under Blending, set the Mode for the fill.
Set the Opacity for the fill. Lower opacity values create more transparent fills.
Enter a Tolerance value (0-255). Lower values (10-20) fill similar colors, while higher values (100 or more) fill a broader range of colors.
Refine the fill behavior for your image:
- Anti-alias: Create smoother edges on your filled areas.
- Contiguous: Fill only connected areas, not the other parts of the image.
- All Layers: Fill based on color data from all visible layers, not just the active one.
Select the area of the image to fill. The Paint Bucket fills all pixels within your specified tolerance range.
Tip
To avoid filling transparent areas, lock the layer's transparency in the Layers panel.
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