Expensive vs. Cheap Skincare Products

From cheap to expensive products, we analyzed 677,165 product reviews to find out how the price of a product impacts its rating.

When it comes to skincare, everyone has their holy grail products.

For some, it's an affordable drugstore moisturizer, and for others, it's a premium serum that comes at a pricey cost.

And since there are products available at a wide range of prices, we wanted to look into the data to see if the more expensive products actually had better overall ratings.

The analysis of 677,165 customer reviews

We analyzed the rating of 677,165 customer reviews and found that:

• Products worth the splurge: vitamin C serums, exfoliants, and moisturizers
• Products that don't get much better with cost: face washes, sunscreens

Vitamin C serums, exfoliants, and moisturizers had significantly better ratings as the price per fl oz. increased.

However, face washes and sunscreens did not get much better as the cost increased.

In fact, more expensive sunscreens actually had a lower overall rating count as the cost increased.

Products worth the splurge

If you're considering a premium product, you may get more bang for your buck on a higher quality vitamin C serum, moisturizer, or exfoliant.

1. Exfoliants were the best product to splurge on - cost had the most impact on ratings
2. Moisturizers were the next best product to splurge on
3. Vitamin C serums were the third best product to splurge on

We don't think any skincare addict would be surprised to learn these products tend to get better as you spend more money.

Products not worth the splurge

While some products may be worth the splurge, we also learned that some products don't get better with cost.

1. Face washes did not get much better as the cost increased
2. Sunscreen reviews actually got worse as the products got more expensive

Our theory: face wash and sunscreen each have a core function.. to clean, and protect the skin.

As long as they're doing what they were designed to do, the customers were not as critical.

Amazon gets the most customer reviews for skincare products

We analyzed a total of 677,165 reviews across Amazon, Target, Walmart, and Ulta. Of those reviews, 73% of them came from Amazon.com

The total review breakdown per site:

1. Amazon: 493,467 reviews (73%)
2. Target: 68,339 reviews (10%)
3. Walmart: 68,830 reviews (10%)
4. Ulta: 46,529 reviews (7%)

Is it any surprise that Amazon has become the #1 destination for consumers to review skincare products?

Average ratings on each site

We also wanted to learn how consumers rate products on each platform.

Here's what we found:

• Reviewers on Wal-Mart and Amazon give higher ratings
• Reviewers on Target and Ulta give lower ratings

Perhaps those who shop at Target and Ulta for skincare products have higher expectations for their beauty purchases.

Methodology

We analyzed a total of 677,165 customer reviews across Amazon.com, Ulta.com, Target.com, and Walmart.com.

We then broke down each review by rating (1-5) and analyzed the results for each category.

The data is accurate as of February 2022.