The Army Painter maps miniature painting beginners to three starter kits

Pick the kit that matches the way you paint

The mistake is buying a starter set for a painter you are not. The Army Painter’s three-box lineup makes a cleaner promise than the usual all-in-one beginner bundle: choose the set that matches your workflow, and you are far more likely to finish minis instead of collecting unopened supplies. That matters whether your goal is one display piece, a tabletop-ready squad, or a fast, smooth basecoat for a whole army.

The logic is simple. If you want control, reach for Warpaints Fanatic. If you want speed, Speedpaint 2.0 is the shortcut. If you are already thinking about an airbrush, Warpaints Air is the set that saves you from buying the wrong paint twice.

Warpaints Fanatic is the cleanest entry for brush painters

Warpaints Fanatic Starter Set is the box for the painter who wants to learn the craft the traditional way, with a brush in hand and real control over every layer. It includes 11 paints total, specifically 7 acrylic colors, 2 metallics, 1 wash, and 1 brush-on primer, plus a free miniature figure and a starter brush. That is the kind of contents list that actually covers the first night at the desk, not just the first five minutes.

The practical details are what make it useful. The bottles have mixing balls pre-loaded inside, so a quick shake gets the paint moving and helps you hit the right consistency faster. The company says the set was developed with feedback from the hobby community, which is exactly the kind of thing that tends to show up in a better starter box, because it usually means less dead weight and more usable paint.

The included miniature is a Knight from Cephalofair Games, and the beginner guide points to a QR code that links straight to an easy painting tutorial. That combination is smart: one figure, one brush, one primer, a tight paint selection, and a path to getting paint on plastic without spending an evening watching tutorials and still not starting. If your real goal is learning brush control and understanding how primer, metallics, wash, and base colors work together, this is the set that makes sense.

Speedpaint 2.0 is for getting an army painted without dragging it out

Speedpaint Starter Set 2.0 is built for a different kind of painter, the one who cares less about building a layered recipe and more about getting models table-ready. The set includes 10 unique colors, 5 new colors, and a free Basecoat Brush, which tells you exactly what it is for: fast coverage, quick decisions, and a result that looks coherent across multiple minis.

The line’s core pitch is the reason it keeps showing up in army-painting conversations. The Army Painter describes Speedpaint as a one-coat painting solution that gives you contrast, shading, and highlights in a single application over a primed miniature. That is a huge workflow difference when you are staring down rank-and-file troops, because every extra step slows the project down and raises the odds that the unit stays half-finished for months.

The bigger Speedpaint 2.0 family backs that up. The complete set has 90 colors and includes 3 free brushes, and the broader range includes the original 24 Speedpaint colors reformulated for speed and performance. That is the sort of line expansion that makes sense for painters who start with a small starter box and later want more options without abandoning the method. If your real complaint is not “I need more technique,” but “I need a faster way to get ten, twenty, or forty minis across the line,” this is the box that saves you time and keeps the process sane.

Warpaints Air is the best first step only if you are ready for an airbrush workflow

Warpaints Air Starter Set is the one for painters who already know they want to work with an airbrush, or who are ready to build their painting around smoother basecoats and larger batches. The set includes 12 airbrush-ready Warpaints Air paints and 1 x 100 ml Warpaints Air Primer, so it is aimed at a serious workflow from the start rather than a dabble. The paints are pre-thinned and ready to use right out of the bottle, which is a real convenience if you have ever wasted time over-thinning a color and then trying to recover it.

The bottles also come with two steel mixing balls, which helps keep the paint usable with a shake instead of a rescue mission. Army Painter says the Air range uses a Colour Triad System, designed to pair base and highlight colors and make army painting faster and more intuitive. That is a useful system if you want to speed up batches without making every model look flat, and it is one of the few starter-set structures that actually rewards planning ahead.

This is also the set most likely to save you money in the long run if you know you are going airbrush-first. Buying traditional brush paints and then replacing them with airbrush-ready colors later is the classic expensive mistake. If you are already committed to the tool, start with the paint built for it.

How to avoid the expensive beginner mistakes

The real decision is not “which starter set is best” in the abstract. It is which one matches the way you actually spend your hobby time. If you want to practice layering and control on a single Knight or a small display piece, Fanatic gives you the cleanest, most versatile launch point. If your priority is a painted army before the next game night, Speedpaint 2.0 is the fastest route to a finished table presence. If you are already committed to airbrushing, Warpaints Air keeps you from buying a second set of paints later.

That is the value of The Army Painter’s setup: it treats starting miniature painting as a choice of workflow, not a one-size-fits-all test. Founded in 2007 and headquartered in Skanderborg, Denmark, the company has spent years selling the idea that painting should be simple, beautiful, and fun, and the three starter kits reflect that philosophy in very practical terms. The best first purchase is not the biggest box; it is the one that gets you to a finished miniature with the least wasted money and the fewest dead ends.