Clinique vs NYX: Is this even a fair battle? You’d be surprised!

10 years ago who knew how important eyebrows would become in our lives today? Well for me, anyway. When I was sixteen I never did anything with the two, naturally thin lines above my eyes that I call “eyebrows”. First of all, I didn’t know how to…and second of all, I thought I was naturally ‘gifted’ because thin brows were in by then so my brows I thought, were ‘in’!

I started drawing them on when I was 18 – and it was using a black In2it eyebrow pencil I stole from my younger sister. It wouldn’t even be considered drawing on eyebrows because I literally drew a tail at the end of my two brows (my eyebrows are sadly, only halfway given – from the start to the middle and that’s basically it!) and call it a day.

As I grew older, I got into threading (what was there to thread in the first place anyway?!), and then drew my eyebrows with a very high arch. I thought I looked hot. And the worst part is, I used eyebrow pencils that weren’t even my color! Imagine the ugly stripey zebra look I must have had!

L-R: NYX, Clinique

I grew out of the highly-arched-evil-looking phase a couple years back, and then started to venture into the straight Korean eyebrows.

I know, I have an eyebrow identity crisis! The straight eyebrows weren’t too bad on me, but then I grew bored of it and soon enough went looking for my next “eyebrow look”.

That was how I discovered eyebrow gel.

I’ve tried plenty of brands – most of them sucked for me by the way, even the Benefit Gimme Brow which didn’t do anything for my pathetic brows! But very recently, I purchased the Clinique Just Browsing brow mousse in Deep Brown and I thought it was the best eyebrow product that I’ve ever discovered. I even asked my friends to try them on and they too agree!

I bought the product, roughly around the same time as my youngest sister when she bought the NYX Brow Gel in Espresso. She raved about it to me all the time – so I decided to try it on and make a comparison with my Clinique.

Both are good products at the end of the day, but there are still a few things that really put these two in different positions. The Clinique has a very small wand that makes it very easy for precise application on the eyebrows. It is very unlikely that you mess up your brows with the very diminutive wand. The NYX on the other hand, has a wand the size of any regular eyelash mascara. Unless you have very steady hands, you are bound to get some product on your forehead or eyelid.

I don’t usually do such thin eyebrows but just for review purposes… Voila, my (almost) natural brows! On my right brow I have on the NYX brow gel, while on the left I’ve got on the Clinique. 

Next up is the formulation of the product. The Clinique is scentless and it doesn’t clump at all. No matter how many layers you’ve applied to your eyebrow, your tiny hairs won’t get clumpy and would still look like one hair is separated from the other. Get what I mean? As for the NYX, it has a very, very strong scent albeit a very short-lasting one. It may go away once the product on your brow dries up – but it still bugs me somehow. And  just a side note, when applying the NYX, be sure to not coat too much product on your eyebrows as it tends to get clumpy. But then again, do understand that a little goes a long way and only a little is what you need so this product isn’t all bad!

Both products are good in my honest opinion – they dry up quickly once applied and have good lasting power. You can go the whole day without having to worry that your eyebrows might smudge like pencil eyeliner on a hot or rainy day – but I’d still give Clinique the upper hand in this round.

The Clinique is available at Clinique counters for RM65 while you can get the NYX one in Sephora stores for RM30-ish. Sorry for the uncertainty, but trust me it’s pretty cheap!