We’ve all seen the cute Ipsy and Sephora Play ads on Facebook and Instagram, but which one is better and how can you pick just one? I couldn’t decide between the two, so here’s my honest review on both to help you decide which one is better!
Ipsy
Since I’ve had Ipsy for longer, I’ll review it first. Ipsy is $10/month and each month you get five trial products. They release a preview of your bag between the first and fifth of the month.
Pros:
I love how in-depth Ipsy’s beauty quiz is. There are a ton of questions to really get to know you, and it asks so many varying questions about what you like and don’t like. Every month also comes with a super cute, reusable makeup bag (really makes this worth the $10!) so you can switch yours out every month or even gift them to other people. Products range from highlighters to face masks to mascara and everything in between. Ipsy also lets you review the products, and you get points for every time you review so you can get freebies! They have a waitlist, but you can usually get off of it in just a few hours by sharing a link to your Facebook page (pro tip: you can delete the post right after).
Cons:
The downside is that a lot of the items aren’t from super popular brands. I like this because you get new brands that you never would’ve tried before, but if you want only name brand products this may not be for you. Another downside is that there’s usually no perfume samples.
(Here is a look at my Ipsy bag from this month.)
Sephora Play
So after getting addicted to makeup subscriptions, I decided to sign up for Sephora Play. Sephora Play is $10/month, and each month comes with five trial products and one surprise bonus each month (usually a small tube of perfume). They release a preview of your bag in the second or third week of the month.
Pros:
I love that Sephora gives you only high end brands in their makeup subscription. It makes the $10 super worth it. There’s a pretty wide variety of items and I’ve gotten everything from BB cream to Kat Von D tattoo liner with a multitude of products in between. There’s usually a pretty varied mix of items, and it’s rare to find a month where you dislike everything. I also really love that Sephora gives you skincare items as well, so it’s a pretty wide variety of beauty items. Although their beauty quiz isn’t super in depth, they always manage to give me exactly what I want, and I’ve gotten foundation that was my exact shade, which was pretty great. I also love the bonus items and the perfumes are always super nice.
Cons:
One of the biggest cons for me is that there’s no system for reviewing items, so if you totally hate something and don’t want anything like it again, you can’t review that. I also was disappointed with them because they used to have cute drawstring bags that the items came in every month, but they recently switched them to plastic bags which isn’t sustainable or cute. This may not be a con, but their preview of your products comes out extremely late in the month. One last disappointing thing is that sometimes it takes forever to be able to sign up for the subscription because they are so limited in how many they have.
(Here’s my Sephora Play Box from this month.)
In all, I can’t choose between the two on which one I love more because they’re both amazing in their own ways. I would definitely suggest buying the two of them though because I’ve always had good luck with both!
Images Courtesy of the Author