For 9 famous originals, SkinSort lists the press-named dupe in 5 cases, at positions 1, 2, 10, 10, 19. In 2 of those its headline match sits above both of the two scores shown beside it.
SlipperSkin finding
Read on 23 October 2026, SkinSort's dupe finder listed the press-named dupe for 5 of 9 famous beauty originals; the other 4, all of which have a SkinSort page, were missing from lists of 15 to 50 products, and its ingredient match ran 12 to 26 points above the raw ingredient overlap.
Sometimes. Of 9 originals where both products have a SkinSort page:
It scores every product against the one you pick and shows the closest, highest first. Its dupe finder page says the score factors in ingredients, attributes and benefits, that a higher score means a closer match, and that attributes mean what a product is meant to do. It also says it cannot always detect an ingredient's concentration, which is why attributes are added. The results page for each original lists up to 50 dupes; each carries an overall match, an ingredient match and an attribute match.
That gives a clean test. The beauty press has named a specific dupe for each of a set of famous originals, and our 15-pair study already holds the ingredient lists for them. We opened each original on SkinSort and looked for the press-named dupe in its list.
Five of 9 are listed, at positions 1, 2, 10, 10, 19. La Mer's page shows only 5 dupes and puts NIVEA Creme first, the pair NewBeauty reported in 2024. Rare Beauty's blush lists e.l.f. Camo at number 19 of 24, behind 18 other blushes. For 4 originals the named dupe is absent: SkinSort has a page for it, but it did not make the list, which holds 15, 41, 43, 50 products (the cap is 50).
| Original and dupe | Position | Overall match | Press |
|---|---|---|---|
| La Mer → NIVEA Creme | #1 of 5 | 62% | NewBeauty (2024-02-01) |
| Summer Fridays → Trader Joe’s | #2 of 50 | 78% | Yahoo (2024-12-10) |
| Charlotte Tilbury → e.l.f. Halo Glow | #10 of 42 | 65% | PureWow 'What the Dupe' (video page) |
| D-Bronzi → e.l.f. Bronzing Drops | #10 of 14 | 57% | Yahoo (2024-06-08) |
| Rare Beauty → e.l.f. Camo | #19 of 24 | 59% | BuzzFeed (2024-03-24) |
| Milk Makeup → e.l.f. Power Grip | not in 15 | n/a | PureWow (2024-10-09) |
| Drunk Elephant Protini → Bubble | not in 41 | n/a | Yahoo/StyleCaster, TikTok coverage (2023-01-20) |
| Laneige → e.l.f. Holy Hydration | not in 43 | n/a | BuzzFeed (2024-03-26) |
| Supergoop → e.l.f. Suntouchable | not in 50 | n/a | BuzzFeed (2026-05-19) |
For the 5 listed pairs, SkinSort's ingredient match was higher than the share of ingredient names the two lists actually have in common, in every case, by 12 to 26 points. The two numbers measure different things: ours counts exact names shared out of all distinct names on both lists, SkinSort's is a weighted score it does not publish. Where we can compare counts directly they agree: La Mer's list has 43 ingredients on both sites, and SkinSort says La Mer and NIVEA Creme have 13 in common against 14 in our read of the brands' own lists.
Not an average. SkinSort shows an ingredient match and an attribute match beside the overall one, and in 2 of the 5 listings the overall figure is higher than both: Charlotte Tilbury → e.l.f. Halo Glow (58 and 60, overall 65); Rare Beauty → e.l.f. Camo (49 and 55, overall 59). The page says the three are combined into a unique score and does not give the weighting, so the headline is best read as a ranking tool rather than a measure of similarity.
1. Search the original, then look for the dupe you were told about: 4 of 9 named dupes were not in the list. 2. Read the ingredient match, not only the headline: it ran 12 to 26 points above the raw overlap. 3. Treat the headline as a rank, not a measure: it sat above both of its parts in 2 of 5 listings. 4. Check size and price yourself; the finder scores formula, not value per gram. 5. Dupes are not clones: see the 15-pair study.
Use SkinSort's as a shortlist generator, not a verdict. It found the pair the press made famous for La Mer and Summer Fridays and ranked it first or second; it did not list the dupes named for Milk, Laneige, Drunk Elephant's Protini or Supergoop. Whether a product is a dupe depends on the job you need it to do, and the finder scores formula. Price per gram, size and shade are yours to check; our Sephora and Ulta price check shows how often a same-size price differs less than people expect.
On 23 October 2026 we opened SkinSort's dupe page for each original in Chrome (the site refuses plain automated fetches) and recorded the position and three percentages of the press-named dupe, searching the list by product name. Nine of the 15 pairs in our dupe study have a SkinSort page for both products that we could open by name; the others were left out, not counted as absent. SkinSort pages are per product, not per shade or flavour, so a flavoured original may differ from the page we matched. Lists stop at 50 products. Our overlap is the share of distinct ingredient names common to both lists, computed from the lists in our dupe study; SkinSort's lists may be a different version of a formula. We did not use or buy any product.
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Yes. Its dupe finder scores every product against the one you choose and lists up to 50 closest matches, each with an overall match, an ingredient match and an attribute match, according to its own page and results read 23 October 2026.
SkinSort says its score factors in ingredients, attributes and benefits, and that a higher score means a closer match. It does not publish the weighting; in 2 of 5 listings we read, the overall match was higher than both its ingredient and attribute scores.
SkinSort lists it first of 5, at 62% overall, 50% for ingredients and 63% for attributes, saying the two share 13 ingredients. In our read of the brands' own lists they share 14 of 43 and 16.
SkinSort has a page for each of the 4 missing dupes we checked, so it is a ranking choice, not a gap in its database: the lists hold 15, 41, 43, 50 products against a cap of 50. We cannot see SkinSort's weighting to say why.
Use it to rank candidates, not to prove two products are the same. SkinSort's ingredient match ran 12 to 26 points above the share of ingredient names the two lists actually share, and the overall figure is not an average of its parts.
SkinSort's dupe finder is a useful shortlist, and it finds some famous pairs and misses others. Search the original, check whether the dupe you were told about is there, and read the ingredient lists before you trust a percentage. If a listing here is out of date, the SkinSort team is welcome to tell us through the contact page and we will correct it with the date.