Put the same luxury vinyl on the stairs and use a stair nosing of the same color. Most luxury vinyl have coordinating stair nosing.

Hmm. I'd try samples of Rubio Active Stain Smoke (brown) and/or Fumed (gray), followed by a coat of Bona NordicSeal or NaturalSeal. The Rubio products chemically change the wood color and can be watered down to mitigate the effects.

Take a white oak board and a plank be prepared to a paint store, and be prepared to spend an hour. A specialty paint store, not the big box. : )

IMO use the same vinyl you have on the floors no wood is going to exactly match what you have .

Thanks for your recommendations. I decided against the vinyl on the stairs. I’m aware that the wood might never match perfectly, I just need them to be in the same tone of color I’d say. I’m going to look into the Rubio products, I’ve never heard of them and I might try a paint store this weekend because I’m not making any progress. I tried to add a few drops of dye yesterday to the white base to give it a greenish tone 🤣 don’t do that, it’s a waste of time

The color is unnatural and is unlikely to be achieved with just stain so will likely require some type of chemical adjustment. Another possibility is to use 2-part wood bleach (hydrogen peroxide and sodium hydroxide) which would also have to be diluted with water, followed by a light taupe/grey stain and coats of non-yellowing water. Some people use oxalic acid as a bleach but I've never used it.

that’s a good idea, I’ve used wood bleach before but do you think it would make a difference on white oak? I looked at Rubio stains and it’s a little overwhelming, they have so many colors available.

I was referring to the Active Stains, aka chemicals that change the wood color. Fumed turns the wood gray and Smoke turns it brown. You would not want to use their stains which are hardwax oil, so they have a small component of wax and are a bit slippery.

Bleach definitely works on White Oak but using it full strength would make it too light. Probably need to try somewhere between 10 or 20 water to 1 bleach, lightly sand to remove the grain raise, then apply a very thinned out stain, maybe DuraSeal Warm Gray mixed with neutral. The negative to all I'm suggesting is that these are products used by professionals and may be hard to acquire, and even then not in small sizes.

https://www.ghsproducts.com/rubio-monocoat-creative-effects-fumed/

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/00/4d/b1/004db1c15ef6c01421534e469729c0a8.png

@Vanessa K Wife and I are doing the same thing. I was wondering, what did you decide on?

@Lil B we decided to not match and make it more of a "separation". You'll never be able to match 100% so do a contrast that isn't a HUGE contrast. By a nosing piece, and use different stains on it and test out what you would like best

Same thing here, I couldn’t match them to my flooring but the difference is really not too noticeable. I used Rubio monocoat oil in DC smoke and it didn’t change the color of my wood. it didn’t make it orange or gray like regular stains do. And it protected the wood at the same time, so no polyurethane needed. I found Rubio on amazon.

Provincial and country white stain!
Perfect contrast