"Waverley" has had several colour schemes in her life. At launch the paddle boxes were painted black, in 1959 they were changed to white, then returned to black but with white edges in 1972, then to all black in 1977. The two gold stripes along the hull were removed in 1954 but restored during the 2000 rebuild. Today, "Waverley" has the LNER 1947 livery of red, white and black funnels, traditional brown-grained (or "scumbled") superstructure and black paddle-wheel boxes, decorated with gold lettering on each side.