Ladybug

"Tikki, spots on!"

- Marinette during her transformation into Ladybug

"In the daytime, I'm Marinette. Just a normal girl with a normal life. But there's something about me that no one knows yet 'cause I have a secret."

- Marinette in the opening

"Ladybug saved Paris from destruction once again, but who's gonna save Marinette from her homework?"

- Marinette/Ladybug

Marinette Dupain-Cheng is one of the main protagonists of Miraculous: Tales of Ladybug & Cat Noir. Marinette is a school student in Paris. With her Miraculous, inhabited by a kwami named Tikki, she has the power of good luck and can transform into the superhero Ladybug.

She is voiced by Anouck Hautbois in the French version and Cristina Vee, who also voices Meiko Mochizuki, Mio Akiyama, Homura Akemi, Hawk, Sailor Mars and Morgiana, in the English version.

Appearance
Marinette is half-French and half-Chinese. She has light blue eyes, freckles and black hair with blue highlights that she usually wears back in two pigtails with red bands.

As a civilian, she wears a dark gray overshirt with sleeves and a collar that are white with pink polka dots and outlined with black. Underneath, she wears a white t-shirt with a black collar and sleeve line and a design below the collar with black leaves and pink flowers. Also, she has pink jeans and light pink dress shoes with dark red soles. She wears the earrings which are silver when not holding Tikki.

As Ladybug, she wears a red suit with a black collar and black spots. Above her hips, she wears her yo-yo around them with the string, and she wears a red mask with black spots. Her earrings become red with five black spots, and the bands holding her hair back become red ribbons. Her hair and her eyes become slightly bluer.

Personality
A kind and clumsy girl, Marinette is happy, cheerful, effervescent, and generous. She loves fashion, her friends and family, and her crush Adrien. But she does struggle with self-confidence and self-esteem. If a situation she deems dangerous, like doing something for Adrien or losing a book that will expose her secret identity, she becomes very nervous and awkward, failing to keep calm and being quick to panic. She deeply cares for other people, and she usually puts their feelings and interests before her own, in some cases being at a personal cost. Despite being genuinely kind, she does have her limits, such as in "The Evillustrator", when she gets irritated with Chloé to the point that, as Ladybug, she refuses to continue watching her to protect her. She can also act impulsively and irrationally at times, as shown when she tries to deflect the false accusation of "stealing" Chloé's bracelet onto others who are also innocent. Although she is absentminded and acts before thinking at times, mostly if Adrien is involved or she is panicking about a dilemma, she is extremely clever, like hiding her signature in her bowler hat design that exposes Chloé for stealing her design.

She also takes advice from others very well whether it's family or friends seen in "Malediktator", "Heroes' Day" and other episodes.

As Ladybug, Marinette retains many of her alter ego's characteristics, but she is much stronger. Her confidence and bravery come out more prominently. Her quick-thinking, resourcefulness, and wits are more obvious, especially when she is figuring out how to utilize her Lucky Charm. Marinette strives to rescue everyone, including those akumatized by Hawk Moth. No matter the difficulty of her tasks, she does everything in her power to set things right while keeping up with her everyday responsibilities, like designing something or working in the bakery. Like Cat Noir, Ladybug is clever with her words and occasionally enjoys making puns. She has a more serious side when fighting against Hawk Moth's villains, as opposed to Cat Noir's laid back and goofy personality. At times, she enjoys teasing him and others, while she can get exasperated, she handles joking calmly. Marinette as Ladybug, is more cautious and careful than Cat Noir sometimes needing to restrain or stop him from doing hasty acts seen in several episodes. As her alter ego, Marinette strives to keep her personal and superhero lives separate to protect herself, the people she knows or she is close to. She is also great at giving advice to others when they need it. With her greater confidence, she aims to be honest with others in other ways, like her honesty with Cat Noir about not having romantic feelings for him.

In "Mayura", she also acknowledges that good things come by doing good actions and that not all problems can by solved by wishing them away, especially at the expense of hurting the innocent.

As a civilian
Marinette has talent in fashion design. She sketches ideas in a notebook, and she can sew by hand or with a machine. Using computer software to create graphic designs is also an ability Marinette possesses for creating things. She wears her own creations, such as her little purse, and she also makes things for others, like Adrien's scarf and the bakery's logo. Her skills in this field are exceptional for an amateur such as when her pigeon-styled derby hat that she made is good enough to be recognized by a professional designer, Gabriel, despite the fact that she has never made one before. She is also very skilled at video games, easily beating Max and getting the highest score in the entire school.

Marinette has high stamina, endurance and agility even in her civilian form as displayed in Timebreaker. Marinette has also run long distances without stopping in several episodes. She is also quite stealthy, as she frequently sneaks up on Adrien and other people without being noticed.

As Ladybug
Ladybug has much more enhanced skills, such as speed, agility, and strength, and she is almost invulnerable to physical damage. She has remarkable talent with wielding her yo-yo, like using it as a grappling hook, a rope to restrain others, a projectile, and if she spins fast enough, even a shield. After an evil Akuma is released from its corrupted object, she can open her yo-yo and throw it to grab it, remove the energy that Hawk Moth charged it with, and release it as a normal butterfly.

Her special power, Lucky Charm, helps her by summoning an object that she uses to achieve her objective, it often being to stop a villain. However, it drains her power and reverts her back to Marinette shortly afterward, so she has to use it wisely. Once the villain is dealt with, Ladybug can throw her Lucky Charm object into the air and use the Miraculous Ladybug, which will make it revert back to energy and fix all of the damage done since the villain was created.

Trivia

 * The "Ladybug Vision" shown after using her Lucky Charm is not a superpower, but instead a tool to allow the viewer to see what will happen.
 * Marinette is similar to Randy Cunningham from Randy Cunningham: 9th Grade Ninja.
 * Both main characters are in high school.
 * Both wear red and black.
 * Both solve their problems quickly.
 * Both have a double life.