3
Guides published
Each one answers a single buying question.
Independent buying guides
Decide which serum, cream or SPF your routine needs
For shoppers in the UK who want to know what a skincare step actually does before paying for it. Each guide answers one buying question, shows sourced figures with their check dates, and prints the cost-per-use formula it uses.
3
Calculators
Formula, units and assumptions shown on the page.
10
Sources cited
Each with the date the link was checked.
9
Photographs
Free-licence images, photographer credited.
Browse by question
How to choose
The decisions that actually change what you end up with.
1
Photo: North Lincolnshire Museum, Lisa Staves, 2007-07-30 10:02:33 · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Ingredients
What is on the label and what it does.
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Photo: Pittigrilli · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Routines
Order, frequency and how long a bottle lasts.
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Photo: Pittigrilli · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Budget and prices
What the total comes to once everything is counted.
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Photo: National Photo Company Collection · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
Evidence
What the published evidence does and does not show.
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Photo: National Photo Company Collection · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
Reactions and irritation
Reactions, patch testing and when to stop.
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Photo: Netstars22 · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Start here
Each guide answers one buying question and shows the figures behind the answer.
How to choose
How to choose a serum, cream or SPF from the label alone
A UK cosmetic label carries eight things by law. Here is what each one tells you, and which claims the seller has to be able to prove.
Photo: Pittigrilli · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Budget and prices
Cost per use: what a skincare routine really costs a day
Price per millilitre, a dose in millilitres and the days a bottle lasts. The same four steps can cost £0.94 or £2.44 a day on the same routine.
Photo: Pittigrilli · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Reactions and irritation
Patch testing and what to do when a product stings
Reactions appear within hours or days, which is what makes a patch test work. How to introduce one product at a time and read the result.
Photo: National Photo Company Collection · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
How this site works
Every figure in a guide is taken from a named source, with the date it was checked. Where a number is an assumption or an example, it says so in the same sentence.
We do not run paid product tests, we do not publish reader reviews, and we do not claim to have handled every product mentioned. Where a claim needs a lab or a long-term test we do not have, the guide says that plainly.
Photographs are free-licence images from Wikimedia Commons or Openverse, credited to the photographer with the licence named. Charts are drawn from the figures printed in the same guide.
This site earns money from advertising and, where disclosed, from affiliate links. That does not change the order of a comparison or the conclusion of a guide.
Advertising is not enabled on this site yet. When it is, ads will be labelled and kept visually separate from the guides.
Calculators
Each calculator shows its formula, units and assumptions. Nothing is estimated for you in secret.
Cost per use calculator
Turns a price into a cost per use, so a dear item used often can be compared with a cheap one used rarely.
cost per use = (price + consumables over the whole life) / (uses per week x 52 x years)
Routine cost calculator
How long a bottle lasts and what the routine costs per day, from dose and container size.
days per container = container size (ml) / (dose in ml x applications per day); cost per day = price / days per container
Landed cost calculator
What a cross-border order really costs once shipping, duty and tax are added.
landed cost = (item price + shipping) + duty + tax, where duty = item price x duty rate, and tax = (item price + shipping + duty) x tax rate