Clay masks

The short read

• The minerals are the point. Where another format reaches for a gum or a glycol to get its texture, this one reaches for a clay, and the three that do the work are printed on a large share of these lists and almost nowhere else in the catalogue.

• This is the format most likely of those with a page here to print a drying alcohol - which is a reading of the list, not a verdict on the mask, and the table below gives the share against the catalogue's.

• Iron oxides and titanium dioxide, both classed as colourants in the encyclopaedia, appear here well above their catalogue shares. A clay mask is a coloured thing, and some of that colour is added.

• A pot does not come with an application count on it, so most of the per-use figures on this page are estimates. Read them as indicative rather than exact.

What these lists print that others do not

Not the most common ingredients - water is on nearly every list ever written and tells you nothing about a format. These are the entries that appear far more often here than across the 219 masks as a whole, counted by encyclopaedia entry rather than by printed name.

• Magnesium Aluminum Silicate9 of 28 here·12 of 219 overall
• Bentonite12 of 28 here·16 of 219 overall
• Kaolin20 of 28 here·30 of 219 overall
• Loess7 of 28 here·11 of 219 overall
• CI 77491 (Iron Oxides)9 of 28 here·19 of 219 overall
• Ci 77891 / Titanium Dioxide9 of 28 here·24 of 219 overall
• Stearic Acid7 of 28 here·19 of 219 overall
• Sorbitol7 of 28 here·20 of 219 overall

Names without a link have no encyclopaedia entry yet, so we make no claim about them beyond the count.

What these labels print

Seven readings of the ingredient list, each counted the same way across this format and across the whole catalogue, so the second column is the baseline the first is worth reading against. Every one of them is a statement about what is printed on a pack - not about what a mask does, and not a verdict on any of them. The pregnancy flag in particular is a reason to read a list rather than a warning: it marks a mask carrying something the encyclopaedia says to check, which is a different thing from a mask being unsafe.

Vegan status is unrecorded for 16 of the 28 masks here, so that row counts only the packs where we found it stated - unrecorded is not the same as not vegan. How far into a list we can read is its own reading: the encyclopaedia has an entry for a median of 80% of each list here, against 82% across the catalogue. The rest is printed in names the site cannot yet decode, and an undecoded name is one we make no claim about either way - what we do not know.

Every format side by side

5 of the 10 formats in the catalogue clear 13 masks, which is the floor at which a page says something a filter could not. The rest stay in the catalogue and out of the pages, because a median over one or two products is not a median - and they are exactly what an unscoped superlative loses to, which is why they are in this table rather than left out of it. Every figure here is counted across all of them, so the claims above are scoped to something you can check.

Formats without a link have no page of their own. A median marked ≈ is one where every per-use figure behind it was worked out from pack size rather than counted.

All 28 clay masks

Cheapest use first. Every one is on sale in the EU and has a published ingredient list we could source and check.

• 

  Balea

  Gesichtsmaske Totes Meer

  21ingredients

  !1 ingredient we would look at twice

  €0.23 per use

• 

  Luvos-Heilerde

  Anti-Stress-Maske

  33ingredients

  !6 ingredients we would look at twice

  €0.38 per use

• 

  BIO:VEGANE

  Gesichtsmaske Pore Detox Clay Mask

  19ingredients

  !1 ingredient we would look at twice

  €0.48 per use

• 

  alkmene

  Mein Teebaumöl Anti-Unreinheiten Maske

  16ingredients

  !4 ingredients we would look at twice

  ≈€0.54 per use

• 

  Schaebens

  Totes Meer Schlamm Maske

  14ingredients

  !2 ingredients we would look at twice

  ≈€0.60 per use

• 

  Beauty of Joseon

  Ground Rice and Honey Glow Mask

  35ingredients

  ≈€0.64 per use

• 

  Salthouse

  Totes Meer Therapie Gesichtsmaske Mineral & Heilerde

  17ingredients

  !2 ingredients we would look at twice

  ≈€0.68 per use

• 

  Luvos-Heilerde

  Anti-Aging-Maske

  27ingredients

  !4 ingredients we would look at twice

  €0.85 per use

• 

  Luvos-Heilerde

  Hydro-Maske

  33ingredients

  !8 ingredients we would look at twice

  €0.85 per use

• 

  Luvos-Heilerde

  Reinigungs-Maske

  28ingredients

  !8 ingredients we would look at twice

  €0.85 per use

• 

  Luvos-Heilerde

  Vital-Maske

  30ingredients

  !8 ingredients we would look at twice

  €0.85 per use

• 

  Q+A

  Activated Charcoal Face Mask

  18ingredients

  ≈€1.18 per use

• 

  Isntree

  Mugwort Calming Clay Mask

  38ingredients

  !2 ingredients we would look at twice

  ≈€1.20 per use

• 

  La Roche-Posay

  Effaclar Purifying Clay Mask

  20ingredients

  !2 ingredients we would look at twice

  ≈€1.22 per use

• 

  Dr. Scheller

  Detox Heilmoor Maske

  22ingredients

  !1 ingredient we would look at twice

  ≈€1.28 per use

• 

  AXIS-Y

  Mugwort Pore Clarifying Wash Off Pack

  36ingredients

  !2 ingredients we would look at twice

  ≈€1.63 per use

• 

  Origins

  Clear Improvement Active Charcoal Mask to Clear Pores

  23ingredients

  ≈€1.82 per use

• 

  Luvos-Heilerde

  Hydro Booster mit Clean Maske

  63ingredients

  !8 ingredients we would look at twice

  €1.89 per use

• 

  The Ordinary

  Salicylic Acid 2% Masque

  19ingredients

  !2 ingredients we would look at twice

  ≈€2.07 per use

• 

  Caudalie

  Vinergetic C+ Instant Detox Mask

  33ingredients

  !12 ingredients we would look at twice

  ≈€2.08 per use

• 

  The Body Shop

  Charcoal Pore Minimising Mask

  37ingredients

  !11 ingredients we would look at twice

  ≈€2.16 per use

• 

  Dr. Hauschka

  Clarifying Clay Mask

  4ingredients

  !1 ingredient we would look at twice

  ≈€2.27 per use

• 

  Avène

  Cleanance Detox Mask

  18ingredients

  !2 ingredients we would look at twice

  ≈€3.14 per use

• 

  Kiehl's

  Rare Earth Pore-Minimizing Clay Mask

  19ingredients

  !1 ingredient we would look at twice

  ≈€3.33 per use

• 

  Aesop

  Chamomile Concentrate Anti-Blemish Masque

  16ingredients

  !9 ingredients we would look at twice

  ≈€4.56 per use

• 

  Rosental Organics

  Avo Clay Mask

  17ingredients

  !1 ingredient we would look at twice

  ≈€5.28 per use

• 

  SKIN1004

  Madagascar Centella Poremizing Quick Clay Stick Mask

  23ingredients

  !1 ingredient we would look at twice

  ≈€5.68 per use

• 

  THALGO

  Klärende Intensiv-Maske

  32ingredients

  !4 ingredients we would look at twice

  ≈€6.33 per use