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How Do I Choose the Best Cream Eyeliner?

Alex Tree
Alex Tree

The best cream eyeliner goes on smoothly, does not wash off easily, and compliments rather than detracts from your eyes. Choosing the best cream eyeliner often involves some experimentation, especially when it comes to choosing a high-quality product that glides on and stays on. In addition, most people choose a cream eyeliner to draw attention to their eyes or make their eyes appear bigger. This is best accomplished by choosing an eyeliner that is not significantly brighter than your eye color; for example, someone with blue eyes should probably select a color other than bright blue. Eyeliner guidelines are basically the same for both sexes, even if the makeup is specifically marked for a certain gender.

Read online reviews and ask friends or family for product recommendations to determine what products to test. If people frequently complain about the poor-quality brush of one product but rave about the actual cream eyeliner, the product might be worth checking out if you purchase a separate eyeliner brush. On the other hand, if the product itself is reportedly clumpy or dries hard and looks unattractive, it might be wise to skip it altogether. Although it is entirely possible that you would like a cream eyeliner that mostly received poor reviews, there are so many different brands and products within those brands that taking a 50/50 chance on a product is unnecessary.

Woman posing
Woman posing

Once you have settled on a brand that appears reputable and high quality, visit a local beauty store to pick out a color and try it on. In general, it is best to choose a shade that is not significantly different from your own eye color. For example, using forest green eyeliner on a person with light green eyes will likely make people notice his or her eyeliner first rather than his or her eyes. An exception to this rule is people with dark eyes, usually brown, who can wear just about any shade of cream eyeliner, depending on their skin tone.

Lastly, men’s eyeliner is a marketing technique, much as men’s shampoo or men’s moisturizer. Other than the packaging, the essential ingredients are the same. If you are male and looking for the best cream eyeliner, you will have a much wider selection when including women’s products in your search. Many cosmetic stores do not carry men’s cream eyeliner, but some salespeople are used to selling women’s eyeliner to men.

Discussion Comments

burcidi

@feruze-- I'm not an expert and I'm sure someone who works in the cosmetic industry could explain this better.

Overall, I don't think there is too much difference. Gel eyeliner probably implies that it is water based and cream must imply that it is oil based. Gel has a much lighter consistency and cream eyeliner is a little thicker. Since gel is water based, it might be easier to remove than cream eyeliner. This might mean that cream eyeliner lasts longer.

Either way, they work the same in terms of application. They might need a different kind of brush maybe, but I'm sure you could apply both with an eyeliner brush too.

bear78

What's the difference between cream eyeliner and eyeliner gel? I've always thought that they're the same but there must be a difference since cosmetic companies label them this way.

I have an eyeliner set that's labeled as cream eyeliner. This brand is really cool because they made different cream eyeliner sets based on a person's eye color. So they have one for brown eyes, one for green and one for blue.

I have the one for brown eyes. It has a shimmery gold color, a shimmery brown color and black. It's really nice and looks really pretty. I'm glad that they thought of this concept because I probably wouldn't have thought of combining these three colors by myself.

Sometimes I wear them alone, or sometimes together. When I wear them together, I line my lower lashes with the brown, upper lashes with black. Lastly, I put some of the gold shimmer on my inner lids as a highlighter.

fify

The price of the product and how the eyeliner applies is very important to me when shopping for cream eyeliner. I agree with the article that it should apply smoothly and last a long time without wearing off or smudging.

The other quality I look for is the pigmentation of the cream eyeliner color. If the product is not pigmented, even if it looks really pretty in the jar, it won't be very apparent on the skin. I don't like it when I have to re-apply my cream eyeliner mid-day.

And I absolutely hate eyeliners that dry up in the jar and become inapplicable. It should remain moist and soft as long as it's not expired. And the color should not lose pigmentation.

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