Lincoln Cent "Color" Question

A good way to see differences is to go to a site such as Heritage Auctions (coins.ha.com) and look through certified examples in the different color grades.

What I have found is that a coin has to be really really red to make a RD grade but that there's a really wide range of the RB coins. Some are very red and some subdued red. BN is pretty much what you'd expect.

So - if you are buying a RD or BN you pretty much can know what to expect but with a RB coin, they can really vary a lot.

I often look for RB coins with lots of red remaining as 1) I like that look; 2) they are more available and somewhat cheaper than the full RD coins - especially as you get back into the earlier dates.

I recently posted a thread about some of my pennies "toning out" due to years of sitting in a PVC coin folder environment. They went into the folder as shiny new pennies and then turned to (what I am gathering) a toned Red Brown. As I understand the pennies go from a NEW state of Red to an in between state of "red brown" and then to a circulated state of color of "Brown".
Experts, is this correct?
I also understand that the 2x2 will not allow the coins to change.

Like others have said...

Red is shiny - new. Brown is like used. Red-Brown is anything in between.

Biokemist - not even the slabs will stop the natural progression of oxidation that browns copper. They turn in the holders.

Kenkat - for the reason above it's best if you want to learn color designation on Lincolns by looking at slabs, best to look at slabs made in the past ten years or so. Anything older than that is likely not the exact same color as when it was placed in the slab.