Several kinds of site answer “is this product any good?”, and they are built very differently. The useful question is who does the judging on each one. Here is that answer for the sites people use most, including ours.
None of these is the one right answer. Each is good at a different job, and most people who care about their skin end up using two or three of them.
| Site | Who does the judging | What you get | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| The Guru Indextheguruindex.com | Dermatologists, cosmetic chemists, estheticians and other trusted skincare experts, in the reviews they have already published on YouTube. We collate them; we do not test products ourselves. | One Guru Score per product, built from every expert take we have logged, with each take quoted and linked to the moment in the video. Sponsored takes stay on the page, labelled, but count for half as much as an independent one. | Seeing what the experts, plural, think of one product, and where they disagree. |
| SkinSortskinsort.com | An ingredient database run by an independent team, plus reviews written by the people who use the products. | Full ingredient lists with explanations, filters such as fragrance free, product comparisons and dupes, and customer reviews you can search by skin type. | Checking a formula against ingredients your own skin reacts to. |
| INKEEDecoderformerly INCIDecoder | No one rates products. The site explains ingredients. | Plain explanations of what each ingredient on a label is and does. | Understanding what an ingredient list actually says. |
| AllureBest of Beauty | Beauty editors, with dermatologists, cosmetic chemists and makeup artists weighing in on the yearly awards. | Editor-tested product picks and an annual list of award winners. | A shortlist of new launches that a magazine team has tried. |
| Good HousekeepingBeauty Lab | Chemists in the Good Housekeeping Institute, using lab instruments alongside consumer testers. | Measured results on things like hydration and wrinkles, and yearly beauty awards. | Seeing a claim tested with instruments. |
| Individual expert channelsfor example Lab Muffin, Doctorly, Dr Dray | One expert, or a pair, reviewing in depth. | Long, detailed reviews with the reasoning behind every verdict. | Depth from one voice you already trust. These are the reviews The Guru Index collates: see Lab Muffin, Doctorly and Dr Dray on our site. |
Some of the most detailed skincare reviews anywhere are the ones dermatologists and cosmetic chemists give on YouTube. The trouble is that they are scattered across hundreds of hours of video, and two experts you trust can quietly disagree.
So we gather every take they give on a product into one place and add them up into a single Guru Score. A product with a Guru Score of 90% is one the experts talk about warmly almost every time it comes up. A split score tells you they disagree, and the takes underneath show you why.
We do not test products, we do not take shoppers’ star ratings, and no brand can pay to appear. The experts are independent of us and have not endorsed anything we publish. See how the score works and who we are.
The questions people ask most often, answered from the expert consensus. Each list updates as new reviews come in.
Yes. The Guru Index gathers the reviews that dermatologists, cosmetic chemists, estheticians and other trusted skincare experts publish on YouTube, and turns them into one Guru Score per product. Every take is quoted and linked back to the original video, so you can check it yourself.
SkinSort starts from the ingredient list and from customer reviews. The Guru Index starts from what skincare experts say about the product. They answer different questions, and they work well side by side: SkinSort for whether a formula suits your skin’s triggers, The Guru Index for whether the experts rate it.
They answer different questions. Customer reviews tell you how a product felt to a lot of people, and they are good at catching texture, smell and breakouts. Expert reviews tell you whether the formula makes sense and how it compares with the alternatives, which a star rating cannot.
When an expert is paid to feature a product, the take stays on the page, labelled, but it counts for half as much as an independent opinion. We looked at how much sponsorship changes a verdict in our study of sponsored and unpaid reviews.
Search any product and see what the experts said about it, the raves and the takedowns, in one place.
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