There’s probably hundreds of posts online about dupes for the original beautyblender – and it’s for good reason, like many people, we’re reluctant to spend £16 on a sponge that needs replacing pretty frequently. We were inspired to write this post after buying and loving Revolution’s Pro Blend sponge, we just had to see if the real deal beautyblender was as good!
So we bought both, brand new and unused from a genuine supplier (there are so many fake beautyblenders out there). We’re going to test these babies and see if it’s worth paying the £11 difference.
And we’ve done GIFs – amazing, right?
Lookswise, they are quite similar – they’re both a shade of hot pink, and they’re both a teardrop shape. When they’re in their respective boxes there isn’t much between them.
When they’re out, you can see that the Revolution sponge (on the left) is shorter and fatter, while the original bb is a darker colour and is thinner and longer. In your hand the beautyblender feels a lot lighter, not that the Revolution blender is heavy, but the bb weighs almost nothing.
Let’s see some gifs.
This is the sponges dry, Revolution is on the left. The BB is much squishier.
Now, it’s time to put them under the tap.
This is the Revolution sponge, it gets a lot bigger when you wet it, it takes a little while to absorb all the water, and it holds onto quite a bit of it when you’re trying to wring it out.
Here’s the beautyblender:
It swells up straight away and doesn’t retain much water after you squeeze it. Please ignore me failing to turn the tap off.
Wet squeeze test time.
Hopefully it’s quite easy to tell that the beautyblender (on the left) is a lot squishier when wet in comparison to the Revolution sponge. They both got a lot bigger when we ran them under the tap, which a lot of “dupes” don’t really do.
Now for the real test, how does it blend?
For this test we’re going to be using Clinique’s beyond perfecting foundation, it’s quite a full coverage foundation, so you should be able to see how it blends with both of the sponges.
First up, the £4.99 Revolution sponge.
Now, the original beautyblender.
Pretty identical, right?
Final thoughts
Is the Revolution Pro Blend sponge a dupe for the beautyblender? Well, in once sense, no. If you gave both of them to me to use, I’d definitely be able to tell which one was which, but in another sense, they totally are. They both blend really quickly and the finish is identical. The biggest difference is that one is three times the price of the other.
That being the case, we totally recommend checking out the Revolution Pro Blend sponge, at £4.99 it’s a real bargain, and it was one of our top products of 2016, the beautyblender is good, we won’t lie, but having to squeeze it out a few less times at the sink isn’t worth £11!
Hey! I’m Bronni and I’m a financial journalist and deals hunter in my mid 20s. I’m really into cats, pop music, the internet and barely substantiated celebrity gossip.
