Finding the perfect mascara can feel like an endless quest, regardless of your lash type. The goal is often to discover a formula that delivers length, volume, and overall "wow" factor without clumping, flaking, or weighing down the lashes. This review explores a variety of mascaras, focusing on their ability to lengthen lashes while maintaining a natural and appealing look.
Many individuals constantly strive to find the perfect formula-in this case, the best product for long lashes. Despite a lengthy fringe, it's not the easiest task. Mascaras can tend to make lashes appear similar to spider legs, a look no one strives for. Other times, some formulas weigh down lashes, making them appear chunky and stuck together.
To find the best mascaras for achieving long lashes, ten different popular formulas were tested, with each mascara receiving a rating out of five stars based on overall coverage, volume, and "wow" factor.
This mascara ($21) is more brown than would normally be tried, but it didn't disappoint. It gave lashes natural volume with just one coat and lasted all day! If you're normally a black mascara girl, consider giving this one a shot.## Overall rating: ★★★☆
The natural curl this mascara ($67) gave in just one coat was impressive. The brush is full of fibers to give you that falsies look, and the formula is enriched with ingredients like pro-vitamin B5, rice phytoceramides, castor oil, and passion flower extract to strengthen lashes (so it's actually good for you!). If you're used to being a little more conservative with mascara purchases, you might want to save up for this one.## Overall rating: ★★★★☆
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As a relative newcomer to Clinique products, the results of this formula ($21) were pleasing. Although the formula didn't last the entire day, it's recommended as the perfect mascara for a "no-makeup makeup" look. It definitely gives you a subtle curl and darkens the lashes so they are slightly more prominent.## Overall rating: ★★☆☆
As a first-time user of Borghese, this mascara ($21) was an awesome introduction to the brand. It was super-lightweight on and lasted all day. The formula is a bit thinner than most mascaras I've tried, so two coats were applied to my lashes. Even after two coats, there were no flakes (which is a huge plus!). If you're looking for a natural-looking mascara and don't mind the additional coat, you'll have a soft spot for this mascara.## Overall rating: ★★☆☆
This mascara ($24) instantly lifted and lengthened eyelashes after one coat. However, towards the end of the day, eyelashes were a little dry and flaky.## Overall rating: ★★★☆☆
Naturally, it was hoped this formula ($32) would be as fabulous on lashes as it is in the tube, and it was. The instant feathery look it provided after just one coat was loved. The formula lasted all day and didn't cause any clumping, which is one of the main concerns.## Overall rating: ★★★★
As a sucker for pretty packaging, this mascara ($32) was appealing before even using it. Upon opening it, however, the brush was significantly smaller than those of mascaras I've used before, so I was a bit skeptical to try it. Smaller brushes work better for shorter/thinner lashes. This formula lifted lashes but didn't give the volume I hoped for.## Overall rating: ★★★☆☆
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After a strong recommendation, this neuEnvy mascara ($32) was tried. The long wand and the eyelash brush were really loved. A lightweight, feathery look for lashes is a huge plus and that's exactly what this product provided. In addition to lasting all day, this was actually a very easy formula to remove. this new formula ($22) left fringe feeling soft. You also don't need much of this mascara to get the job done, which is always a plus.## Overall rating: ★★★★☆
This mascara ($24) is the one! First of all, the packaging alone is ridiculously cute. Additionally, the wand itself is amazing. The angle of the brush could easily be adjusted to lift and curl lashes easily. A formula like this had never been used before and it gave lashes life like they have never received before . . . all with just one coat! This is the mascara lashes deserve.
With dozens of brands and hundreds of different formulas available, you can find both terrible and awesome mascaras from $6 to $60. That’s where we come in. To find truly great mascara, we tested more than 30 options, sent 12 finalists to a diverse panel for brand-concealed testing, and ended up with five remarkable standouts, including an excellent everyday mascara, a sleek tubing option, an exceptional lengthening mascara you can get at the drugstore, a vampy dramatic formula, and a reliable waterproof choice. We hope there’s one on our list that you love, too.
Rare Beauty Perfect Strokes Universal Volumizing Mascara creates lush volume and noticeable length, and it stays put all day without running or crumbling. Rare Beauty was founded by Selena Gomez, and we were curious if the brand’s renown had more to do with celebrity than quality, but this mascara exceeded our expectations, doing everything well and nothing poorly.
It volumizes and lengthens. Many of the mascaras we tried did only one or the other. Testers raved about the volume they achieved with this Rare Beauty mascara; true to its name, the thick formula had a firm texture, and the bushy brush deposited a lot with each stroke, key to creating volume. But the mascara also deftly coated the entirety of testers’ lashes, making them look longer, too. It wasn’t the most lengthening mascara we tried-that award goes to our other picks from Thrive Causemetics and Maybelline-but it did a darn good job in that regard. “The length was solid,” a panelist summarized.
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Similar mascaras we tried (thick formula, fiber brush), such as Gucci Mascara L’Obscur, added volume at the lashline but didn’t deposit enough of the mascara on the tips. Others made the tips stick together in an unpleasant, leggy way. “As someone with sparser, shorter lashes, I really liked this one. The volume is great, and the length is pretty decent, too,” said senior updates writer Annie Chou.
You get a lot from one coat. When it first hits the lashes, the thick Rare Beauty mascara is clumpy. But after even just the first comb-through, the pigment distributes evenly while maintaining its heft, creating a sturdy foundation at the base of the lashes with very little actual mascara. You get a lot of value in this long-lasting tube.
It feels weightless, and it stays on. Sometimes, the very bulk that helps volumize lashes weighs them down, and that heaviness makes eyes appear smaller, not bigger. All that mascara is also prone to flaking off. In contrast, this lightweight formula doesn’t feel heavy, it leaves lashes lifted, and it’s really on there. “It stayed on quite well in 90-degree heat,” noted senior updates writer Sri Rain Stewart. “Removal was pretty easy, too.”
Thrive Causemetics Liquid Lash Extensions Mascara is an inky black mascara that leaves lashes decisively separated and noticeably lengthened. Though it rinses away with water and a little scrub, it’s singularly long-wearing. Thrive heavily markets the mascara as a “tubing” formula, and prior to testing we weren’t certain that would mean much of anything. But it did.
It adds length to each lash. Whereas most mascaras we wore coated existing lashes, essentially making them stand out more, the Thrive Causemetics mascara extended length beyond the natural hair shaft.
Traditional mascaras color lashes with pigment dissolved in a water and wax or oil base, painting each hair shaft. Tubing formulas work a little differently, carrying pigment in a film-forming polymer base that wraps each hair in microscopic “tubes” of color to physically lengthen the lashes. “The length was beautiful,” one tester noted. Another said her lashes looked “magically” longer: “This is the best lengthener, hands down,” she wrote.
The brush is nimble and gives great definition. The plastic brush is shaped like a tidy, narrow Christmas tree that has had its top lobbed off, and the handle has a heavy and purposeful weight. You can feel a little resistance when tugging the wand from the tube, a sign that the wiping disc is ensuring that it doesn’t pick up too much mascara. All of those factors work together to deposit a precise amount of mascara onto lashes without smudging, clumping, or unevenness. Lashes turn out sleek and evenly coated in a way that’s both believable and noticeable.
The pigment is true black. Unlike with any of the other mascaras our panelists tested, this mascara’s black shade, called Brynn, contains a single coloring agent: iron oxides CI 77499. (Our other picks brighten or lighten true black with pigments such as ultramarine or zinc oxide.) Senior editor Jennifer Hunter put it simply: “Wow, this is really black.”
It’s water-resistant and long-wearing. After one tester experienced a morning sob, took a restorative steamy shower, and followed up with an even steamier romantic encounter, they saw zero black streaks, just a little less fullness. If you’re hunting for a mascara that’s waterproof-ish-that is, it lasts all day but doesn’t require an oil-based cleanser for removal-this Thrive Causemetics mascara is just the ticket.
It does require a somewhat precise removal technique, though. After wetting your lashes for 30 seconds, you must apply a gentle downward swoop or pinch to pull off the tubes. It’s not difficult, but it takes a bit of practice.
It dries quickly, so you can’t build much volume. Even after a couple of quick swipes, this mascara never builds a thick, vampy fringe.Removal takes some practice. “It was a little difficult to get off, but once I got the hang of it, it was actually easier to remove,” one tester wrote.
You can find about a billion drugstore mascaras out there, but Maybelline Lash Sensational Sky High is our favorite. Maybelline’s marketing claims that it’s both a lengthening and volumizing formula, but we found it to be exceptional in the former regard. It gave our testers long, deftly separated lashes in a shiny, believable black without transferring or crumbling. At a typical price of about $13 a tube, it’s also the most affordable and widely available of our picks.
Lashes look longer, but not in a fake way. The formula is slick and wet, so it evenly covers even the most feathery, wispy hairs from root to tip. Our testers nearly unanimously reported that one coat made their lashes seem longer, plain and simple-not as if they were wearing a full row of false lashes, but as if their own lashes were elongated.
The brush is precise. The flexible brush in this Maybelline mascara is bendy and densely dotted with spikes-longer at the base, shorter at the tip-which together make it amazing at delivering generous, even coverage. It enhances and defines every millimeter of natural lashes and creates great separation. It’s almost identical to the Thrive Causemetics mascara brush, at half the price.
The color looks natural. We found the standard shade, called blackest black, to be an inky onyx that didn’t look artificial. “It was obvious I was wearing makeup, but I liked that it still gave more of a natural look,” said one tester, who has no pigmentation in one set of their lashes. It also stayed shiny, not matte, once dry.
The thin formula isn’t particularly thickening or volumizing. Although you can build density with additional layers, the real story here is about the length. Ingrid reported that although she typically prefers a brush that gives length and volume, she likes that this formula gives a “natural-looking stretch of length.” Someone with thin or sparse lashes may prefer the volume from the Rare Beauty or Too Faced mascara.
Too Faced Better Than Sex Volumizing Mascara is usually the most expensive mascara of our picks by a few dollars, and it’s worth the splurge since it does so much, so well. One coat provides a natural boost; a few more can achieve a thick, lush fringe. This showy mascara is ideal for a day out or a special event, or as an everyday mascara for someone accustomed to flashier looks.
The brush is big and bold. Of the 12 mascaras we sent to panelists, this Too Faced mascara had the biggest, fluffiest, densest brush. Too Faced’s co-founder confirmed that the brush’s hourglass shape was inspired by Marilyn Monroe’s measurements. Lore aside, the grippy brush makes it easy to pile on a lot of mascara with no smudges, but it’s equally excellent for comb-through separation. To be sure, it doesn’t precisely etch every single lash-that’s more Thrive Causemetics’s vibe-but that isn’t the point here.
Each swipe deposits a lot of mascara, but it’s not heavy or messy. When you pull the brush from the tube, it has a startling lack of resistance, which means that the wiping disc allows a lot of the mascara to stay on the fibrous bristles. The creamy Too Faced formula bulks up the base of the lashline, even more so than our pick from Rare Beauty. The effect isn’t subtle or natural-people will know that you’re wearing mascara, and a very pretty one at that.
It’s the most buildable. This mascara has a pliant, flexible formula that covers every lash. One coat is enough for some people. But if you keep going with two or three, you get even more fullness and length, with no clumps, tangles, or the unfortunate spider-effect of over-mascaraed lashes. Even more impressive, no one on our testing panel experienced the transfer that’s common with other thickening mascaras we tested, such as Essence Lash Princess False Lash Effect Mascara, which left smudges under our eyebrows.
It goes all night. Unlike some of the other dramatic volumizing formulas we tried, which looked great in the mirror but crumbled and smudged in the first hour of real-life wear, this Too Faced mascara stayed put. For a non-waterproof mascara, it held up nicely to a sweaty time between the sheets and a 30-minute Peloton session. (Not in the same day or on the same tester.)
Although this Too Faced mascara has great longevity, after a full day of wear, some of our panelists noticed a touch of under-eye smokiness and a few flakes (but not full-on raccoon circles).
Most people don’t need to use waterproof mascara every day, especially since such formulas are harder to remove. But Eyeko’s Sport Waterproof Mascara was too well-reviewed to ignore, and we’re glad we didn’t, since it’s an excellent mascara that just happens to be waterproof.
Eyeko’s Sport mascara is different in a few significant ways: In addition to being officially waterproof, it comes in a squeezy tube and has a curved brush, and the formula contains nylon fibers for fullness and elongation. All of those factors team up to boost fullness and length and leave lashes looking natural and unfussy. Plus, you can swim, shower, and bawl in it with nary a smudge.
The curved brush gives lashes exceptional coverage. The Eyeko mascara brush is shaped like the curve of an eye. That intuitive line makes it easy to paint the outermost corners of the lashes, something no other mascara did quite as well. One panelist couldn’t stop raving about how well she was able to reach her teeny bottom lashes, maybe more effectively than with any other mascara ever: “I’d use it just for that!”
The nylon adds volume and length. Look closely at the swirl of mascara on the tip of the Eyeko brush, and you’ll see tiny hair-like fibers. Those bits of nylon work to physically bulk up the thickness of the lashes and add length. We found that the fibers better served to add length, with one tester noting that it made her lashes swoop up to graze her eyelids-in a good way.
It has a satisfying build. The first coat of this Eyeko mascara is subtle, as it bestows a slight darkening, a bit of density, and a touch of length to lashes. But because the formula doesn’t dry too quickly, you can gradually dial up the intensity by adding more coats without lashes feeling crispy, heavy, or sticky in the process. That’s unusual in comparison with most waterproof or long-wearing mascaras we’ve worn, which tend to dry fast and rigid, leaving little room for adjustment.
tags: #basic #beauty #lengthy #lashes #mascara #review
