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What Is Acrylic Paint?

Most paints are composed of four ingredients: pigments, binders, solvents, and additives. In the case of acrylic paint, it’s made of pigments suspended in water (a solvent) and acrylic polymer (a binder).

The water content in acrylic paint makes it easy to clean when wet but permanent once dry. That’s because the water evaporates as the paint dries, leaving the binder to lock the pigment in place.

Used without a medium, acrylic paint can dry in as little as 10 minutes — letting artists create vividly detailed paintings without waiting hours for the base layers to dry. This is much faster compared to oil paint, which has a drying time of 18–24 hours depending on the thickness of the paint used.