La Roche-Posay review
Judge La Roche-Posay on its European catalogue and it is close to the best mass skincare brand in the world. Judge it on what an American can put in a basket and the picture changes.
$15–$45Read review
Shelf
Skincare Brands
Cleansers, actives, moisturisers and SPF — the houses whose reputation rests on what a formula does, not on how it photographs.
7Brands reviewed
8.2Shelf average
8.9Highest score
Paula's Choice review
Almost alone in beauty, Paula's Choice tells you how much of the active is in the bottle. That transparency is the product. The question is whether the formulas justify a price that has quietly doubled.
$12–$60Read review
CeraVe review
CeraVe built an empire on three ceramides and a fatty alcohol. The formulas are genuinely good and genuinely boring, which is the point — but the range has gaps the marketing does not admit to.
$13–$24Read review
SkinCeuticals review
One serum built this brand and still justifies it. Everything else at SkinCeuticals is priced as though it were C E Ferulic, and almost nothing else is.
$38–$182Read review
The Ordinary review
The Ordinary broke the pricing of skincare actives and never quite fixed the shopping experience it created. Ten years on, the good formulas are very good and the catalogue is still a maze.
$6–$32Read review
Kiehl's review
Kiehl's sells 175 years of apothecary heritage in a plain white jar. A few of the formulas deserve the reputation. Most of the range is competent mid-market skincare at prestige prices.
$25–$92Read review
Drunk Elephant review
Drunk Elephant built a brand on banning six ingredient classes. Some of that argument is sound, some of it is marketing, and the prices attached to it are increasingly hard to defend.
$36–$138Read review