Rave: I love how inclusive their marketing campaigns are, and I love how many promotional images/model shots of products in action they release for each collection/product launch. Rant: They have some great products, but they also have some duds and misses–more than I’d expect from newer brand and one backed by Kendo.
— Christine
We're here to help you make better beauty purchases that you'll enjoy and love! We recommend signing up to take advantage of personalized features like tracking products you own, viewing dupes that you already have, and more!
Here are some useful resources for you:
Curious how two shades compare to each other? Type in the shades below to get instant side-by-side swatches!
Comments that do not adhere to our comment policy may be removed. Discussion and debate are highly encouraged but we expect community members to participate respectfully. Please keep discussion on-topic, and if you have general feedback, a product review request, an off-topic question, or need technical support, please contact us!
Please help us streamline the comments' section and be more efficient: double-check the post above for more basic information like pricing, availability, and so on to make sure your question wasn't answered already. Comments alerting us to typos or small errors in the post are appreciated (!) but will typically be removed after errors are fixed (unless a response is needed).
We appreciate enthusiasm for new releases but ask readers to please hold questions regarding if/when a review will be posted as we can't commit to or guarantee product reviews. We don't want to set expectations and then disappoint readers as even products that are swatched don't always end up being reviewed due to time constraints and changes in priorities! Thank you for understanding!
We try to approve comments within 24 hours (and reply to them within 72 hours) but can sometimes get behind and appreciate your patience! 🙂 If you have general feedback, product review requests, off-topic questions, or need technical support, please contact us directly. Thank you for your patience!
Rave: Not only are they already forerunner with inclusivity, but they listen to their customer base. When even more shades were needed to fill gaps, Fenty came through with 10 more! And when many clamored for a a more moisturizing formula with a dewier finish, they are now about to give this to us! Which will be great, as it won’t oxidize the way drier matte foundations tend to do, hers included.
Rant: Almost all the LE collections tend to be AWFUL. I mean, “WOW” level of rubbish. Those eyeliner trios for this summer, the 2018 holiday collection, etc. have been terrible. I’m shocked, because the permanent line is really quite lovely and well formulated!
Isn’t that funny, how the LE collections are so dramatically and consistently bad? It makes me wonder if there’s a 2nd factory or 2nd development team handling them.
P.S. I think I might have said this before, but I always love your comments.
You make a valid point there, SaffyTaffy. Perhaps they ARE using separate labs, R&D and such for their LE collections! And not just Fenty, either. Makes sense somehow, though.
PS: thank you! You make very good, insightful ones, also.
I also love your comments, Nancy!
I don’t have a lot of stuff from Fenty but what I have, I really like. I think the company is releasing too much stuff, though (just from what I’ve seen here) and that’s sort of “diluting” the initial good quality of her releases.
I haven’t given this brand enough attention to give a truly fair rant/rave because the only product I own is the Universal Gloss Bomb. I know most people love it, but for me, it’s too goopy, the doe foot is too big, and the scent is way too strong. It’s ok if I put a tiny bit on my finger and swipe it on, but it is a purchase I regret. And I know a lot of people may disagree, but the pinky-beige plastic packaging on many of the other products looks kind of tacky to me.
This ! I totally agree with the goopyness and strong sent … What glosses do you like in general ? I am looking for one and it seems like everyone likes thick goopy glosses :/
I haven’t found a doe foot gloss that I really like, but I use Dior Addict Lip Glow to add shine to matte lipsticks, or wear it alone for a more natural look.
It’s kind of hard for me to make an assessment on Fenty Beauty, since the brands aesthetics and vibes are just not… me. It’s suits Rihanna and many other people, but not me. I can rant a lot about glitters/shimmers and too much color, but it’s just my personal preference; a brand can be absolutely amazing even if 90% of it’s product will never appeal to me. I could also rant on the pink / nude toned packaging, but it’s just me liking plain old black.
Rave:
-> The brand offers a decent amount of products as minis, although it would be great to see the foundation as well in a mini / travel size.
-> I do have to appreciate the color range of the foundation and concealers. It’s not just the number of shades, it has a good mix of cold, neutral and warm tones, with no gaps across all tones, and mostly natural looking shades. Other brands have 40+ shades, but you can clearly spot a specific gap in an area (mostly in the darker shades, but some have failed with jumping too high from fair/light to medium) or almost half of the shades look so unatural I wonder if they were tested on plastic dolls instead of humans.
-> I like the idea of the Match Stix, being able to get a concealer, highlight, contour and stick them together for traveling with the portable brush and blotting papers; quite practical for people who like cream products.
-> Flyliner Longwear Liquid Eyeliner. Great eyeliner for people like me with no skills and hooded oily eyes.
Rant:
-> Fragrance in products, especially in the foundation; the foundation was one of the few products from the brand I wanted to try. But I do think fragranced make-up and body care is something that relates to Rihanna’s style.
-> Even if the foundation and concealer have a great shade range, the Match Stix has a poor selection of shades and colors; the range from light to medium includes some strangely unatural shades.
-> I have the unpopular opinion that this brand is way too over-hyped for what the products are actually worth. It’s too much marketing that for me even the inclusivity they promote seems almost fake.
-> It barely has anything to do with the brand, but I highly dislike that people aren’t allowed to dislike the brand just because `Rihanna` and just because `inclusivity`. Now it got a little better, but some people where absolutely harassed just because they didn’t like the formula of the foundation. I won’t be surprised if my opinion would be attacked. 😆
I doubt you will be attacked here on Temptalia as Christine screens all the comments and while people may disagree and do, it is never in a vicious way. I agree with many of your points and although the foundation shade range is great it still doesn’t include a shade that works for my daughter and the formula doesn’t work for her either. She is hoping that the new foundation release will have something for her.
I actually have a good match in Fenty (once it oxidizes), but I did had issues with good matches for other foundation ranges with tons of shades; for example in the NYX Can’t Stop Won’t Stop, 45? shades, no perfect match for my light-medium warm yellow complexion… for the warm enough shades one is simply too light, the next is simply too dark (and one would think light-to-medium shades are easy to find). I usually don’t fuss about this too much… I mean there are so many foundations on the market nowadays I could care less if I don’t find a match in one or ten of them. 😆 It’s not like we have to buy / try everything.
These are legitimate criticisms. I say this as a Rihanna fan (hehe).
It is one of the few cosmetic companies that I feel good about supporting. I love how easy it is to find shades that work for me. And thanks to Christine, I have avoided the duds.
Rave: I like what the brand is about. I think that the inspiration and innovation is there. I like that Fenty isn’t afraid to step out of the box. Fenty is a trend setter that ignited the flame under many other companies to be more inclusive and for that they get major props.
HOWEVER
Rant: None of the Fenty products that I’ve used have worked for me. Great in theory and not in execution… at least for my skin type/lip tone/etc. The products, no matter how much I want them to work, just don’t. Hopefully one day I’ll find something I like because I do want to support Fenty as a brand. I was actually really digging the brighter pops of color for lips and eyes that were released this summer… too bad the quality wasn’t there.
Rave: I love several of the products. The Stunna Lip is just that, Stunna!! I am still hoping for a shade increase. I love many of the powder products. I am very happy with the PR campaigns, the inclusivity (yeah I just made that word up!), the permanent line seems to have all the great products and the LE products are usually pretty awful. I much prefer the LE packaging to the permanent line packaging though.
Rant: I was one of the people who quickly purchased all the Holiday 2018 products as gifts for my daughter’s stocking and then when the reviews started rolling in I was appalled. I ended up keeping them and giving them to my daughter but they were terrible.
Even though their is a wide range of shades in the foundation, there still isn’t one that matches my daughter. Right now that isn’t a big deal because she didn’t love the formula either but hopefully with new foundation launches she will be able to find something to work for her. She is mixed and has American Indian, African American, Irish and Norwegian so her undertone isn’t exactly cool, warm, neutral or olive. It is something else!! Her body tends to be warm toned and her face is different. Her face is also much lighter than her body. She mostly uses neutral foundations and then tries to add products to correct her tone. It is a pain for her!
Overall I like the products but haven’t purchased anything since the Holiday fiasco.
Hey Deborah, I understand your daughter’s plight (am a very fair-skinned Norwegian-German-African-American)! Because I have freckles in addition, I can get away with a slightly off undertone because I have to use a light hand anyway.
I only own a few Fenty items, so I don’t know how well I can judge, but I’ll give it a try.
RANTS: Awful, disappointing, LE collections. The eyeshadow palettes released so far have just been so-so. The limited shade range of the Gloss Bomb lipgloss is diappointing. Such a good formula deserves some more options.
RAVES: The huge shade range in foundations, from the get-go. Fenty proved there was a market for the whole spectrum of skin tones, not just a few tan ones in the middle. I love every lip product and Kilawatt highlighter that I’ve tried. I appreciate the non-conventional colors. I feel the makeup reflects the types of bold looks Rihanna is known to wear.
I love my first Fenty purchases – the Galaxy palette and eyeshadow brush . The Foundation is a great color match but it is too chalky on me. I have dry skin and used a good silicone primer . It looks like a coat of powder . Nothing else from the line has tempted me .
Disclaimer: I have only purchased her Gloss Bomb as I don’t live in a city which stocks the brand. With that said…
Rave: I really like Fu$$y – I like having a pinky gloss in my bag to throw on towards the end of the day when I don’t want to fully redo my lipstick. 9ml is a good amount of product, I like the applicator, the scent is noticeable but not offensive to me, and it doesn’t irritate or dry out my lips by the end of the day. I like that the brand does unique/unusual shades and have a unique selling point with the Matchstix product.
Rant: I’m not interested in the more unusual offerings personally, and I also have noted the poor seasonal releases. In a way, the brand seems somewhat gimmicky. Having a unique selling point doesn’t mean anything if your products are poor.
What Christine said. I would have worded it stronger though. What the brand does well, it does great. I love the Gloss Bomb and the foundation range was cutting edge when it came out. I loved the brand’s messaging.
But the duds and misses aren’t just B or C qualify stuff. They are abysmal F level failures, which is just incomprehensible. It’s like the recent glitter lipstick release from Tom Ford. How do you go from solid A to just terrible?
I think the answer has to do with the observation someone else made – LE vs permanent range seems to be the difference. Maybe it’s different QC or factory or less well-researched. But other companies are able to pull off amazing LE products. Why it’s so hit and miss eludes me. It’s why I won’t collect anything Fenty and don’t get excited for their releases anymore.
I’m too happy with the Fenty products I use to do a proper rant/rave. The closest I can come is to acknowledge that the holiday 2018 eye/lip crayons are finicky, but even I didn’t have as much trouble with them as most people here did. In my experience, they seem to work best when applied in a bunch of tiny strokes, brushstroke-style, over the area you wish to cover.
Rave: I think the brand’s aesthetic is nice and sleek. I really like the packaging. They set the stage for inclusivity in shade ranges and really made other brands step up their game. Admittedly I’ve only ever purchased their gloss bombs. But that’s because the other products that she has that I would be interested in, don’t work for me.
Rant: I actually couldn’t find a shade match in the foundation, but I got a sample from Sephora anyway just to try the formula and it was cakey on me. I prefer a more satin finish. The bronzer shades were either too light with the right undertone or too dark with the wrong one. I might be able to pull off one of her highlighter split pan palettes, but it’s not a shade unique enough to my collection so I didn’t. A lot of the highlighter shades just don’t suit me. But that’s okay, they’re not catering to me.
RAVE: I get so inspired by the promo pics.
I absolutely love the wild colors and performance of the Mattemoiselle Plush Matte Lipsticks.
The packaging is super cute to me.
RANT: I didn’t like the universal Gloss Bomb on me, and find it gloopy and messy.
Some of the reviews of her other products are not great, and I’d love it if she had an eyeshadow palette that seemed worth the price.
I wish she had more neutrals, though that’s not her brand’s goal.
No empties recycling program.
rave:So I have very little experiance with Fenty’s other products but I love her lipsticks . I own some from the Mattemoiselle line as well as the poutsicles and liquid lip line . And I love the colors and finishes .
rant: I wish there was more product in the Mattemoiselle lipsticks . Like if they were bigger that would be great since I would probably buy more .
The matte lipsticks bleed, no matter what. I have lip liners and lip primers, and everything to make it work, but they are still unwearable. Trophy Wife looked like the answer to all my makeup prayers, but it performed too awkwardly to wear. The foundation comes in an array of shades but contains perfume so I cannot wear it.
I know people are crazy for this brand, but it’s been mediocre for me.
Rave:
I love how Rihanna set the standard for a broad shade range. She used her platform to promote inclusivity in cosmetics and after Fenty Beauty, every brand that is releasing a foundation line feels the pressure to accomodate to a broad range of skin tones. Fenty isnt the first line to have a 40+ shade range, but Fenty/Rihanna used their platform to bring attention to the lack of inclusivity in the cosmetics industry, compelling lines to act like they are addressing that issue.
Although her advertisements do not necessarily speak to me as I dont live the cool city girl life, I still can appreciate it. The packaging is also very cute too, edgy chic and minimal. I really do love some of the products, and she has some sleeper hits in her line. I use the primer all the time, and I recently purchased the bronzer, which has a nice neutral undertone.
Big Rave-she listens to her customer base.
Rants:
Some of her products are overhyped. The foundations are wayyyyyyy too yellow. My closest match is 320, and thats supposed to be the cool shade! Its still a smidge too yellow. Her highlighters have huge particles of glitter. And like someone else who commented, the Fenty Fandom is intense too.