Nowadays, the colored pigments used in tattoos are essentially organic. When maintained in the dermis, they are susceptible to break down via different phenomena. One of them is sunlight exposure. Another process is the degradation by the environment of the lysosomes and phagosomes present in dermal macrophages, the cells in which the pigments are stored. These degradation phenomena could generate soluble products. Those could then potentially migrate to the upper layer of the skin, the epidermis, which is composed mainly of keratinocytes. Several articles mention a suspected link between tattoos and skin cancers. Allergies and photosensitization have also been reported in the literature. In order to provide information on pigment aging and its risks for the skin, we studied the degradation of three pigments of different chemical classes (Pigment orange 13, Po13; Pigment red 122, Pr122 and Pigment red 254, Pr254) by sunlight exposure and by the phagolysosomal environment of macrophages. After setting up aging methods, we used several techniques to study their effects on the pigments. We showed that simulated sunlight exposure induced a reduction in the size of Po13 particles. We also found soluble products after the degradation of all these three pigments by sunlight. Aging by a solution simulating the phagolysosomal environment of macrophages reduced the zeta potential of the particles to 0 mV. This suggests a 'protein corona' effect involving the immunoglobulins in the solution. We investigated whether pigment aging had an impact on their toxicity to the epidermis using a keratinocyte model, HaCaT cells. We observed that Po13 aged by simulated sunlight exposure was more toxic than the other two pigments studied. Conversely, after aging with the simulated phagolysosomal environment, Po13 and Pr122 were much less toxic and Pr254 slightly less so. A photoproduct of Po13 has also been identified and toxicological studies revealed its cytotoxic potency and its ability to induce the production of reactive oxygen species. It was found to modulate the protein expression, in particular an overexpression of some cytochrome P450 monooxygenases. Our study suggests that the aging of certain pigments by simulated sunlight exposure generates a soluble fraction able to leave the dermis and reach the epidermis, where it would cause deleterious effects.