Cream masks

The short read

• The profile is a moisturiser's rather than an essence's: an antioxidant, an emollient oil and a fatty alcohol are each on a large share of these lists, at well above their catalogue shares. That is what the extra length is.

• The least fragrance-free of the formats with a page here, and the most likely to break an allergen out by name as well as printing parfum. Both are readings of the label.

• A cream mask is a thing in a tube or a jar, so a good part of the per-use figures here are worked out from pack size. The cheapness is real; the precision of any single figure is not.

• The word alcohol on one of these lists is usually a fatty alcohol - a waxy solid used to body up an emulsion - rather than the volatile kind readers watch for. The two share a word and very little else.

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.

• Lactic Acid11 of 32 here·20 of 219 overall
• Helianthus Annuus Seed Oil23 of 32 here·46 of 219 overall
• Tocopheryl Acetate9 of 32 here·21 of 219 overall
• Glyceryl Stearate Citrate8 of 32 here·21 of 219 overall
• Butyrospermum Parkii Butter13 of 32 here·35 of 219 overall
• Citronellol8 of 32 here·22 of 219 overall
• Linalool15 of 32 here·46 of 219 overall
• Cetearyl Alcohol16 of 32 here·51 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 15 of the 32 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 81% 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 32 cream 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 Aloe Vera

  21ingredients

  !3 ingredients we would look at twice

  €0.23 per use

• 

  Balea

  Gesichtsmaske Hyaluron

  29ingredients

  !4 ingredients we would look at twice

  €0.23 per use

• 

  Balea

  Gesichtsmaske Milch & Honig

  36ingredients

  !2 ingredients we would look at twice

  €0.23 per use

• 

  Balea

  Gesichtsmaske Niacinamide

  17ingredients

  !2 ingredients we would look at twice

  €0.23 per use

• 

  Balea

  Gesichtsmaske Retinol

  23ingredients

  !2 ingredients we would look at twice

  €0.23 per use

• 

  Balea

  Gesichtsmaske Vitamin C

  23ingredients

  !5 ingredients we would look at twice

  €0.23 per use

• 

  Schaebens

  Aloe Vera Maske

  34ingredients

  !10 ingredients we would look at twice

  €0.28 per use

• 

  Schaebens

  Gesichtsmaske Feuchtigkeit Sofort-Effekt

  38ingredients

  !5 ingredients we would look at twice

  €0.28 per use

• 

  Schaebens

  Gesichtsmaske Kollagen Boost

  27ingredients

  !4 ingredients we would look at twice

  €0.28 per use

• 

  Schaebens

  Gesichtsmaske Panthenol

  22ingredients

  !1 ingredient we would look at twice

  €0.28 per use

• 

  Schaebens

  Gesichtsmaske Zink

  27ingredients

  !1 ingredient we would look at twice

  €0.28 per use

• 

  SUNDANCE

  After Sun Gesichtsmaske

  25ingredients

  !8 ingredients we would look at twice

  €0.28 per use

• 

  Balea med

  Gesichtsmaske kühlend ultra sensitive

  13ingredients

  !1 ingredient we would look at twice

  ≈€0.30 per use

• 

  alverde Naturkosmetik

  Gesichtsmaske Q10 mit Vitamin C

  40ingredients

  !11 ingredients we would look at twice

  ≈€0.32 per use

• 

  Balea MEN

  Gesichtsmaske Creme-Gel Hydro

  31ingredients

  !5 ingredients we would look at twice

  €0.48 per use

• 

  Balea MEN

  Gesichtsmaske Q10 Anti-Falten

  28ingredients

  !1 ingredient we would look at twice

  €0.48 per use

• 

  Santé Naturkosmetik

  Glow Boost Maske AHA

  29ingredients

  !9 ingredients we would look at twice

  €0.48 per use

• 

  Santé Naturkosmetik

  Moisture Fresh Maske Hyaluron

  24ingredients

  !7 ingredients we would look at twice

  €0.48 per use

• 

  Santé Naturkosmetik

  Skin Vitality Maske Parakresse

  33ingredients

  !9 ingredients we would look at twice

  €0.48 per use

• 

  Schaebens

  Hyaluron Maske

  32ingredients

  !5 ingredients we would look at twice

  €0.70 per use

• 

  lavera

  basis sensitiv Anti-Falten Gesichtsmaske

  42ingredients

  !9 ingredients we would look at twice

  €0.98 per use

• 

  DERMASEL

  EXKLUSIV Totes Meer Maske Anti Aging

  26ingredients

  !3 ingredients we would look at twice

  ≈€1.06 per use

• 

  DERMASEL

  SPA Totes Meer Maske Erholung

  31ingredients

  !2 ingredients we would look at twice

  ≈€1.06 per use

• 

  DERMASEL

  Totes Meer Mineralien Nährende Arganöl Maske

  29ingredients

  !6 ingredients we would look at twice

  ≈€1.06 per use

• 

  Dear, Klairs

  Freshly Juiced Vitamin E Mask

  30ingredients

  !8 ingredients we would look at twice

  ≈€1.13 per use

• 

  Caudalie

  VinoHydra Moisturising Cream Mask (Masque-Creme Hydratant)

  32ingredients

  !1 ingredient we would look at twice

  ≈€1.15 per use

• 

  BIOMARIS

  Super Rich Mask

  19ingredients

  !3 ingredients we would look at twice

  ≈€1.50 per use

• 

  Avène

  Soothing Moisture Mask

  26ingredients

  !2 ingredients we would look at twice

  ≈€1.86 per use

• 

  Annemarie Börlind

  Sensitive Cream Mask

  31ingredients

  !6 ingredients we would look at twice

  ≈€2.10 per use

• 

  Rosental Organics

  Botanical Lifting Effect Mask

  28ingredients

  !1 ingredient we would look at twice

  ≈€4.23 per use

• 

  LA MER

  Ultra Booster Premium Mask Effect

  41ingredients

  !9 ingredients we would look at twice

  ≈€4.86 per use

• 

  Dr. Barbara Sturm

  Face Mask

  18ingredients

  !1 ingredient we would look at twice

  ≈€10.00 per use