How to touch up paint on a car

Little scratches from shopping carts and roadside shrubs and so on are the most common way for cars to get damaged. It’s not worth either the time or money it takes to have a garage clean them up. When you’ve got a noticeable scratch you want to fix, you can do it yourself.

Touching up minor scratches on cars

You’ll need:

Touch up paint
Wax removal wipes (only if the car has been waxed since the scratch occurred)
Mild cutting polish

Buy your supplies at an automotive paint from an automotive shop.
Match the paint color as best you can to the finish you have. Know the manufacturer’s name for your car’s color before you go to the shop. That way, if nothing seems quite the right shade and you need help picking the right one, most auto shops have catalogs that show them what colors each paint will pass for. Hint: you can also do some research online to find a matching color.
You’ll need a rather fine brush so you can apply the paint a tiny bit at a time. The paint may come with an appropriate brush.
For small scratches, the paint need not be exact to disguise the scratch. For larger scrapes, like the one pictured, it will need to be pretty close.
Put a tiny bit of paint on a hidden area to test the color.
Wash the area you’re going to paint and let it dry completely.
If the car has been waxed since the scratch appeared, you will need to remove the wax. You can purchase wax/silicone remover wipes at an automotive store.
Dip the brush into the paint. Wipe off any excess on the inner rim of the container. This is very important, to avoid getting blobs of paint on the finish.
Apply the paint by dabbing a tiny bit onto the scratch at a time. You want to use the least paint you can to make the scratch blend in. Multiple thin coats are always better than a thick coat.
If you do end up with some blobs of paint (almost inevitable on big scratches), let the paint dry thoroughly, then carefully scrape off the excess with a straight razor blade.
Wipe with a mild cutting polish to blend the scratch in.