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(Beauty Hero Awards)

The 21 Best Eco-Friendly Beauty Products Of 2023

Editor-approved picks for your entire routine.

by TZR Beauty Team

Updated: April 27, 2023

Originally Published: April 12, 2023

We may receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

TZR Beauty Heroes are vetted products out of the dozens that land across our editors’ desks throughout the year. This month, TZR’s beauty team shares their favorite eco-friendly beauty buys.

Clean beauty is the Wild West of the industry. Despite its global market value expected to reach $14.36 billion in 2028, a standardized definition of what constitutes a product being “clean” is yet to be determined. The lack of regulations leaves brands to their own devices, determining what’s “clean,” “natural,” “green,” and “sustainable” on their own terms, while consumers are left to figure out what’s fearmongering, what’s greenwashing, and ultimately, what ingredients in their medicine cabinets and showers are legitimately risky.

“I think the last few years have really demonstrated on a large scale how quickly misinformation spreads, especially when data is cherry-picked to skew perspectives. There’s really not one particular online database that consumers can go to to decipher ingredients in terms of ‘clean’ or ‘sustainability,’” says Krupa Koestline, a clean cosmetic chemist and founder of KKT Consultants. “There are apps and websites, but the information tends to be biased and incomplete because the people behind them are trying to drive a fear-based narrative.” That said, Koestline suggests the CoSing database by the EU Commission or the Canadian Consumer Product Safety site as two adequate resources for learning about ingredients.

The silver lining is that a number of brands in the clean beauty space are actually doing good by creating products with plant-based ingredients and safe synthetics rooted in science, bottled up in packaging with minimal waste, and shipped to your doorstep via environmentally conscious shipping.

“While using ‘clean’ beauty products that are sustainably made is automatically a personal choice, cumulatively, it can have an effect on the direction of the $532+-billion beauty industry. We are seeing more investment in cleaner ingredient extraction methods, lower energy-consumption manufacturing processes, and overall less waste,” Koestline shares. “It can help drive this industry to lower its impact on the environment while providing more transparent, safe, and cosmetically elegant products people want to use.”

After testing dozens of products in the clean beauty space all year, TZR’s beauty team came together to decide on the 21 eco-friendly products in makeup, skin, and hair worthy of beauty hero status. You can read how we define “clean” here.

Makeup

Clean Lash Lengthening Mascara

Clean Lash Lengthening Mascara

Is there anything this lash-nourishing tubing mascara doesn’t do? The answer is a hard no. Merit’s Clean Lash tints, lengthens, and boosts volume with the promise of smudge-free wear. The minimalist makeup and skin care brand, co-founded by Katherine Powers, has quickly racked up a cult following for its lineup of elevated essentials made with vegan, cruelty-free, skin-loving ingredients, which are shipped to your doorstep in recyclable and/or compostable packaging.

Revealer Skin-Improving Foundation SPF 25

Revealer Skin-Improving Foundation SPF 25

TikTokers, makeup artists, and beauty editors alike rave over Kosas’ Revealer Skin-Improving Foundation for a few solid reasons: It offers lightweight, medium buildable coverage with a radiant finish, smooths texture, reduces the look of pores, and doubles as a skin treatment. The formula is injected with an all-star lineup of hydrating and plumping skin care ingredients including niacinamide, caffeine, squalane, vitamin B5, peptides, and hyaluronic acid, plus mineral SPF 25 protection. The brand also considers the environmental impact of its products by prioritizing PCR (recycled plastic) packaging and using tubes made from biomaterials.

Lit Up Highlight Stick

Westman Atelier

Lit Up Highlight Stick

Multiple members of the TZR beauty team swear by renowned celebrity makeup artist Gucci Westman’s line because the luxurious formulas are infused with tried-and-true skin care ingredients for a natural, your-skin-but-better finish. Inspired by that covetable post-facial glow, The Lit Up Highlight Stick leaves skin fresh and dewy. The brand uses FSC-certified and recyclable materials for its cartons, but the brand is upping the ante by transitioning to refillable product packaging starting this year.

Posh Lipstick

Victoria Beckham Beauty

In a single swipe, this moisturizing lipstick coats lips in a long-lasting wash of color. With shades ranging from poppy red to tawny nude, there’s an option for every makeup vibe. On top of ensuring the formulas in her line are packed with nourishing botanicals and void of controversial ingredients, Victoria Beckham is also conscious about her brand’s environmental impact. The products are created with minimal plastic, come in FSC-certified cartons, and each order is shipped in recycled and recyclable materials.

SunnyDays SPF 30 Tinted Sunscreen

SunnyDays SPF 30 Tinted Sunscreen

With its National Eczema Association Seal of Acceptance, SunnyDays blurs the lines between skin care and makeup. Each of the 14 flexible shades provides mineral SPF 30 protection minus the white cast and offers light to medium coverage that diffuses redness and discoloration. The lilac tube is made up of 65% PCR, in addition to the brand’s promise to use BHA-free materials and follow cosmetic GMP requirements during manufacturing.

Eyeshadow Singles

Eyeshadow Singles

Once you hit the bottom of this plastic-free PaperFoam compact by Euphoria makeup artist Donni Davy, they can be thrown in your recycle bin or compost. Available in three finishes (matte, shimmer, and metallic), choose your own eyeshadow adventure by mix-and-matching any of the eight shades, or wear them solo for equal impact.

Miracle Balm

This overachieving balm can be applied on its own to enhance skin, layered on top of foundation to refresh your complexion, or used as a highlight and bronzer. However you incorporate Bobbi Brown’s ingenious multitasking formula into your makeup routine, don’t forget to warm it up with your fingertips first. In line with the products’ clean, high-performance formulations, the brand’s unit cartons are made from 100% FSC paper and shipped in recyclable packaging.

Skin Care

SuperFruit Exfoliating Tonic 8% AHA Solution

ROSE Ingleton MD

SuperFruit Exfoliating Tonic 8% AHA Solution

The dermatologist-founded skin care brand has quickly gained fans for combining tried-and-true actives with supporting antioxidant fruit extracts from Dr. Rose Ingleton’s native Jamaica. This gentle exfoliating toner works to dissolve dead skin buildup, clear congested pores, and brighten tone without drying or irritating skin.

Eye Rescue Serum

Susanne Kaufmann

Eye Rescue Serum

This silky-smooth serum is a remedy for a late night: it instantly cools the under-eye area, reduces puffiness, smooths fine lines, and brightens dark circles. Like the rest of the line, it’s powered by locally-sourced active ingredients native to the Alpine regions of Austria and Switzerland. In addition to refillable packaging, Susanne Kaufmann prioritizes sustainability during the manufacturing process, too. Its production facility runs on solar, thermal, and green electricity sources.

Lip Wrap Overnight Treatment

Lip Wrap Overnight Treatment

Yes, it’s possible to sleep your way to smoother lips — if you slather on Ilia’s overnight treatment before bed. The nourishing balm is infused with both exfoliating and moisturizing plant and marine actives to soften and restore skin. In addition to utilizing recycled aluminum, glass components, and responsibly-sourced paper, the brand has partnered with Pact to help customers recycle hard-to-recycle packaging — whether it’s an Ilia product or another brand.

Algae + Moringa Universal Face Oil

Algae + Moringa Universal Face Oil

The recyclable sea-green bottle is highly photogenic, but its contents are why Mara’s Universal Face Oil remains on your feed since launching in 2018. Designed to be safe for all skin types, the blend of non-comedogenic, consciously harvested marine and plant oils replenishes and revives dry, tired skin, plus reduces the look of fine lines and wrinkles. In addition to minimizing the use of single-use waste, the certified plastic-neutral brand gives back to a number of environmental organizations including 1% For The Planet, Sea Trees, and Repurpose Global.

Superfood Cleanser

Youth To The People

Superfood Cleanser

While its legions of loyal fans share how they repurpose their glass jars of Superfood Cleanser into flower vases on Instagram, you can also re-up it with one of the brand’s refill pouches. Like a green juice for your face, the kale-, spinach-, and green tea-powered cleanser removes makeup and dirt while keeping the skin’s pH balance in check.

Regenerative Serum

Regenerative Serum

Leading the pack of brands that turn to science rather than fearmongering when creating their clean formulas, Eighth Day’s hero product stimulates your own skin cells to promote regeneration, and thus improve the conditions of a handful of concerns, including fine lines, wrinkles, dryness, dullness, hyperpigmentation, and elasticity. Formulated by board-certified dermatologist and dermatological surgeon Dr. Anthony Nakhla, the secret sauce is a proprietary blend of synthetic peptides, growth factors, and amino acids, along with familiar ingredients such as hyaluronic acid, niacinamide, glycolic acid, manuka honey, savage ginger root extract, and more.

Daily Stone

Completely void of plastic, Kate McLeod’s solid body moisturizer comes in a refillable bamboo canister. The former pastry chef’s recipe contains a carefully-crafted mix of moisturizing plant oils including avocado, apricot kernel, sweet almond, and fractionated coconut, along with frankincense, rose, and neroli essential oils.

Hair Care

Scalp Revival Charcoal + Coconut Oil Micro-Exfoliating Shampoo

Scalp Revival Charcoal + Coconut Oil Micro-Exfoliating Shampoo

Dry, itchy scalps are no match for this weekly scalp scrub that’s clinically proven to reduce up to 82% of flakes after just one use. Along with creating products mostly comprised of naturally-derived ingredients, Briogeo’s product bottles, tubes, and jars are 100% recyclable and 99% of its secondary packaging (like cartons and boxes) is made with 99% FSC-certified and either compostable or recyclable.

The Leave-In Conditioner

The Leave-In Conditioner

Crown Affair’s lightweight yet mighty leave-in conditioner cream heals and protects strands across all hair types. Fine textures will get adequate hydration with one pump, while thick and curly textures will fare better with three to four. The brand has an extensive list of controversial ingredients it leaves out of its formulas and utilizes recyclable packaging like this conditioner’s glass jar.

HoliRoots Hair Mask

HoliRoots Hair Mask

Rooted in Ayurvedic principles, sibling co-founders Nikita and Akash Mehta have transformed the Indian ritual of hair oiling into a luxury clean hair care brand. The HoliRoots Hair Mask is a repairing treatment made up of mango butter, banana, and coconut cream. In addition to paying homage to the natural plant ingredients used as home remedies in their upbringing, the founders are honoring Ahimsa, the principle of nonviolence towards all sentient beings, through the creation of The Fable Fund Trust, which supports efforts to restore the habitat of wild tigers.

Aceite de Moska Scalp Oil

Aceite de Moska Scalp Oil

Founded by Babba C. Rivera, Ceremonia honors the Latinx community’s hair rituals by sourcing raw ingredients found in Latin America — think cupuaçu butter, maracujá, patauá, and babassu oils. One of the brand’s first launches, the beloved Aceite de Moska is a silicone-free scalp oil that addresses common concerns including dryness, flakes, oily roots, and itchiness, and promotes healthy hair growth. It’s bottled up in a post-consumer recycled bottle and arrives at your doorstep via carbon-neutral shipping.

Foundation Shampoo & Conditioner

Foundation Shampoo & Conditioner

Sustainability is a priority throughout the entire lifecycle of RŌZ’s The Foundation Shampoo and Conditioner. Celebrity hairstylist Mara Rosak formulated the products with a proprietary Botanicomplex (ginger root, frankincense, grape, and walnut) to promote healthy hair, they come in refillable aluminum bottles with reusable pumps, and the duo is shipped in a Boox, a plastic box that comes with a return label so it can be reused on an infinite loop.

Complete Air Dry Cream

Complete Air Dry Cream

One of the biggest gripes about air-drying your hair is that your strands end up dry and frizzy. That’s exactly why Queer Eye star and veteran hairstylist Jonathan Van Ness created this styling cream. Powered by the brand’s signature hemisqualane, a silicone alternative that hydrates and strengthens hair over time, it cuts frizz while enhancing your natural hair texture. The recyclable aluminum tube is also practical — it allows you to squeeze out every last drop. JVN also uses FSC-certified secondary packaging with soy-based ink.

Mane Magic 10-In-1 Hair Primer

Mane Magic 10-In-1 Hair Primer

Streamline your hair care routine with Eva’s 10-in-1 primer. The vitamin-rich treatment tackles a laundry list of hair struggles such as frizz, tangles, dullness, dryness, breakage, and heat damage, to name a few. All of the brand’s products come in recyclable packaging, including Mane Magic’s aluminum bottle. On top of using responsible materials, the brand celebrated its 10th anniversary last year by becoming climate-neutral certified and has a five-year sustainability plan that it tracks on its website.

This article was originally published on April 12, 2023