Favourite Cruelty Free Lip and Nail Products from 2018

Today I have the third post of my 2018 Cruelty Free Beauty Favourites series, where I will be focusing on my favourite cruelty free lip and nail products. If you haven’t yet, check out my complexion favourites and eye makeup favourites blog posts. As with those posts, I won’t just be focusing on the best products of 2018, but I’ll also mention any that were really bad and the products that I want to try.

Lipstick

My favourite traditional lipsticks are the Eye Of Horus Bio Lipsticks. The formula is nourishing, long lasting and wears off evenly. The Bio Lipsticks are vegan, and come in biodegradable packaging so that there’s no waste when you have finished the product. Out of the 7 shades available, I have 5 – Venus Pink, Inanna Honey, Freya Rose, Cleo Plum and their new release, Vesta Red. All the shades I’ve tried have the same amazing formula, but I would love to see the shade range expanded, especially to include a lighter pink/mauve that works for natural makeup days. Check out my full review if you want more information on the Bio Lipsticks.

I got the Hourglass Confession Lipstick Duo as an early Christmas present so I’ve been playing with them for 6 weeks, and I love the formula. It is the longest lasting traditional lipstick that I have come across and it isn’t drying. After an hour of wear, I can’t even feel that I have anything on my lips, but the full colour is still there. They’re vegan and they come with interchangeable packaging so you can just buy the shade rather than the whole lipstick compartment when you run out.

The lipsticks that I use for a natural makeup look are the ELF Matte Lip Color in Natural, which is a crayon product that has a sharpener in the base to make it more precise when it dulls down. As well as the Colourpop Cosmetics Lippie Stix in the shade Aquarius. I bought some of the Colourpop Creme Lux Lips when they first launched, hoping that they would be the same formula as the creamy Lippie Stix, but I find them far too drying to ever use.

I don’t use any matte liquid lipsticks as they are just far too drying and I don’t like the really matte look on my lips. The ones I liked most when I did use them were the Dose Of Colors ones, but I would prefer a formula like the Colourpop Ultra Satin Lips more.

Lip Gloss

My favourite glosses are the Dose Of Colors Stay Glossy lip glosses. They are very pigmented, so they can be worn alone without a colour underneath. They last a long time for a gloss, but you will need to reapply after eating and drinking. There are 12 wearable shades in the range and they’re all vegan, but there is room to add more colours. Anastasia Beverly Hills also makes pigmented lip glosses, which I will also use, but I like the Dose Of Colors formula and shades better. I want to try the glosses from Fenty Beauty as they look like they will be great sheer shades to wear.

Lip Balm

My most used cruelty free lip products are definitely my lip balms. I wear coloured lip balms on both natural and heavier makeup days, as they make my lips look nice without the upkeep of other products. The coloured lip balm that I use the most is the Mecca Cosmetica Tinted Lip De-Luscious Pot in Rose. The Rose shade is a lovely colour on my lips and it wears off evenly. Mecca now stock a stick formula in the same shade called the Lip De-Luscious Glide, but the Glide only has an SPF of 15 whereas the pot has an SPF of 25, so I haven’t bought the glide yet. The stick would be more useful for reapplication at events than the pot though. The other tinted balm I get a lot of use out of is the Bite Beauty Agave Lip Mask in Smashed. The formula is very thick so you really need a mirror to apply it to make sure it is evenly distributed on the lips, but it looks and feels great once on. I haven’t tried the clear version as a night balm yet, but I will getting one soon.

As for clear balms, I will opt for the non-coloured Lip De-Luscious SPF if I’m going to be in the sun at all. If I’m just inside, then I will usually be using my Hanami Vegan Lip Balm in Pomegranate (they also have a Spearmint version too). I also just purchased some lip balms from a small Australian Indie company, called Nur Organics, who package their balms in cardboard. Once the product is done, the packaging can then be recycled so there is no waste from the product. A lot of people rave about the Hurraw Lip Balms but they’re just not moisturising enough for me.

Lip Liner

I need to use a lip liner most of the time as my lips are very undefined, so I need the lip liner to act as a boarder for whatever lip product I am going to wear. I have struggled to find cruelty free lip liners that have both a good formula and a large shade range. The products I use the most are Innoxa No Bleed Lip Liners, theBalm Pickup Liners and the Too Faced Perfect Lips lip liner in Perfect Nude. All of these lip liners are retractable with inbuilt sharpeners on the end, which is the style of lip liner I like best. I really like theBalm’s lip liners but they break very easily, I ordered 4 from the USA website and two came with the inside colour broken, plus the shade name stickers fall off the liners which is really annoying – they have however been removed from tbeBalm’s website, so they may even be discontinued now. Innoxa’s are nice, but they only have 4 shades available and Too Faced’s lip liners have been discontinued. Colourpop have a great shade range but they are made with a plastic cover which makes them really hard to sharpen and they frequently break during sharpening.

The iconic Charlotte Tilbury Lip Cheat lip liner in Pillow Talk has been on my wishlist for a long time now, so I really need to get around to buying it. I also want to try the new Dose Of Colors Lip Liners to see what that formula is like, and Eye Of Horus will be releasing their own lip liners soon too. I’m hoping one of them has a “my lips but better” shade.

Nails

2018 wasn’t a big year for me when it comes to nails, as I was just too sick to paint them most of the time. I didn’t get to buy many polishes either, but I have a couple of favourites to share with you. My favourite polish of the whole year was Chrome Buttons by Emily de Molly. It’s very similar to my favourite shade from last year, Rosy Glow from Grace-full Nail Polish, but it is champagne rather than rose gold. I really enjoyed wearing Grace-full’s 1000 Yellow Daisies, as glitter crellies are my favourite nail polish finish. I would love to see more glitter crellies this year, but they don’t sell as well as other polishes for the makers, so they just can’t make them often. I would love to see more of the metallic flakie polishes and even a silver/white gold flakie topper in a clear base too. The only collection I got for the whole year was the Pretty Serious Neon collection, which was supposed to be for my birthday but I only got them in December with everything that happened.

It was really sad to see so many Aussie Indie Polish brands shut up shop last year. I have updated my Guide To Australian Indie Nail Polish blog post to show which ones are still open, but it’s a lot less than there used to be. The closures have meant that my favourite nail hardener and favourite base coat are no longer available. My favourite top coat is still around though, it’s Clearly On Top From KB Shimmer and I get mine from Femme Fatale Cosmetics. I’m currently waiting for it to be restocked to get more. I may have to try the KB Shimmer base coats when my current ones run out.

If you’re into nail art, then I highly recommended the nail vinyls from What’s Up Nails and the stamping polishes from Hit The Bottle. My favourite nail brush for clean up is the Mitty Fabulously Flat nail art brush – it’s the perfect size for me.

As for nail care, my favourite nail and cuticle oil is from Emily De Molly. I love the lemongrass scent, and the cuticle oil pens make application really easy. If I use the cuticle oil and hand cream often enough, I don’t need to use a cuticle cream. I’m not as picky about hand creams as I am about cuticle oils, so I have a different one in each place that I leave them around the house. I have the Natural Instinct Softening Hand & Nail Cream (vegan), Essano Rosehip Nourishing Hand Creme and Skin by Ecostore Nourishing Hand Cream (vegan) around the house, and the mini 50ml Raww Nourish-ME Hand & Nail Cream (vegan) in my bag. I just bought more of the Skin by Ecostore from Nourished Life (affiliate) and Raww from Flora and Fauna (affiliate), but I have struggled to find the Natural Instinct in store to get another tube of that.

On My Radar

Nude By Nature did a big lip product release, which lots of influencers did sponsored posts for, but I haven’t seen any of those people talk about it since they were paid to, so I’m not sure how good that range actually is. Their range includes Moisture Shine Lipsticks, Moisture Infusion Lip Glosses and Defining Lip Pencils. I might have to find them in store and swatch them to see what they like. If you have tried any, let me know what you thought in the comments.

What do you think of my favourite cruelty free lip and nail products from 2018? Is there something else I should try? Don’t forget to check back for my last post of this series on my favourite skin care products. You can sign up to email updates to get my blog posts sent to your inbox and find me on social media – Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest.