Pen Review: Copic Multiliners 0.3 4-Pack

I bought the Copic 0.3 Wine refill for my Multiliner SP to use during Inktober last October on a whim. I didn’t realize how much I would enjoy using a contrasting color for linework. It’s a bit of a challenge to find the refills for the SPs so when I found the Copic Multiliner 0.3 Pen Set ($12.50) with Cobalt, Olive, Sepia, and Wine, I purchased it immediately. I’ve actually been using these for several weeks but haven’t gotten a chance to write the review until now.

The pen barrels are unusually glittery plastic with a solid-colored, rounded bottom end and a matching, solid-colored flat cap. The logos and text on the barrels is printed in white ink and is mostly inoffensive. The clip on the cap is solid-colored plastic, attached to the top flat part. Its not super-sturdy but it does keep the pen from rolling away particularly if you have the pens on your book, lap or the couch.

The transition between the barrel and the traditional felt/fiber metal tip is an almost-smooth conical transition. You’ll either like this or hate this. I found it fairly non-distracting but I like the more stepped design of the Copic Multiliner SP, which is probably the more traditional technical pen design.

As for the actual colors, I loved getting a way to try out all four of the deep tone colors available for the Copic Multiliners in one convenient package. The wine color still remains my favorite but the cobalt and olive are also great options for other linework possibilities. I burn through felt tip points so fast, I still much prefer to use the SP line and replace just the tips as needed, even though I realize the cost to replace the tip is on par with replacing the whole pen. Somehow, it just feels more environmentally more sound to only throw away the tip, not a whole pen.

If you have never tried colored waterproof, COPIC-proof (fancy term for alcohol-marker proof) fineline, felt/fiber markers before, this set is a great way to try them without investing in a whole system.

If you already know you like felt/fiber tip markers, I recommend investing in the Multiliner SP pens. You can pretty much buy any size pen body (despite what the number says on the tube). Once you own one, you can put any tip and any ink refill into it and ignore the number on the barrel. Just be sure you use the right refill for the tip (smaller tips need the A refill, bigger tips need the B refill). If you want the colored ink refills, head over to MarkerPop, they are the best source I know to get all the SP colored ink refills for SPs.