Insider Picks writes about products and services to help you navigate when shopping online. Insider Inc. receives a commission from our affiliate partners when you buy through our links, but our reporting and recommendations are always independent and objective.
- From pomades to powders to pencils, there are so many different ways to give your brows depth and thickness.
- Laura Mercier’s Sketch & Intensify Pomade and Brow Powder Duo is the best because it lets you customize your brow look, taking it from natural to defined with the stroke of a brush.
I used to be really overwhelmed by the concept of filling in my eyebrows. If I’m being honest, it seemed a little scary! How would I make it look natural? But now it’s one of those makeup steps I never skip. A well-groomed, well-defined brow just kind of brings my whole face together.
My brows are shapely to begin with, thanks to years of obsessive tweezing – not over tweezing, thankfully. But I like to run a bit of pigment through them to give the impression of additional thickness and to make the hairs stand out against the rest of my face. Doing my brows takes a cumulative five seconds, but it makes a world of difference for my finished makeup look.
All brow products are not created equal, though it may appear that way on the surface. That makes the search even more confusing. How do you choose between all the gels, tints, pomades, and powders on the market?
You could go through the trial-and-error of testing countless options until you find your perfect match - or you could read on for five foolproof picks we'd recommend.
Here are the best brow products you can buy in 2019:
- Best brow product overall: Laura Mercier Sketch & Intensify Pomade and Brow Powder Duo
- Best brow gel: Glossier Boy Brow
- Best brow powder: Kat Von D Brow Struck Dimension Powder
- Best affordable brow pencil under $10: NYX Cosmetics Micro Brow Pencil
- Best brow gel tint: Wunder2 Wunderbrow Eyebrow Gel
Updated 5/16/19 by Jada Wong: Updated formatting, prices, and links.
Keep scrolling to check out our top picks.
The best brow powder and pomade overall
Laura Mercier's Sketch & Intensify combines pomade and powder to give your brows the perfect amount of dimension and intensity.
Whether you're shooting for the blocked, sharpened look of Instagram brows or something more subtle and natural, Laura Mercier Sketch & Intensify is a great option. The mini two-pan palette comes with both powder and pomade to help customize to the level of definition and thickness you desire.
A lot of brow pomades feel stiff and heavy, but this wax-gel hybrid is flexible and lightweight. If you accidentally apply too much, you can smooth it out by running a dry spoolie through your brows. In fact, I recommend doing this whenever you apply a brow product with a brush to blend everything together and give a softer, more natural finish.
If you have bushy brows you may want to top this product off with a tinted or clear gel, but otherwise the pomade should be enough to hold the hair in place all day. Sketch & Intensify comes in three shades - Ash, Blonde, and Brunette. The pomade and powder are two slightly different colors, which keeps your brows from looking one-dimensional.
This product is essentially an upgraded version of the discontinued Laura Mercier Brow Powder Duo, which was a favorite of beauty editors at The Strategist and Total Beauty.
"The wax mixed with the powder creates a very natural look and has incredible staying power. It took me years to find my soulmate eyebrow [sic] product, and this is it! Highly recommend," says one Nordstrom reviewer about Sketch & Intensify.
Pros: Wax/powder combo ideal for customization, compact package for travel
Cons: Only comes in three shades, pricey
Buy the Laura Mercier Sketch & Intensify Pomade and Brow Powder Duo at Macy's for $28
The best brow gel
Boy Brow is cool-girl brand Glossier's best-selling product, a one-step gel that fills in and thickens brows in a single swipe.
We recommend a lot of Glossier here at Insider Picks. Emily Weiss' millennial pink-tinged brand is my personal favorite for everyday staples, and its number one bestseller, Boy Brow, perfectly encapsulates why.
Like most of Glossier's lineup, this is a totally no-frills, one-step item that adds just a second or two to your makeup routine but yields big results. Inside the white tube is an itty-bitty wand that reaches every single hair - even the ones so small you didn't know existed - coating each one with a creamy wax formula containing beeswax, carnauba wax, oleic acid, and lecithin. This means the formula is not vegan, for those who are concerned.
This is the only gel I've found that tints and thickens my brows while keeping them soft to the touch so it's not completely obvious that I'm wearing makeup. It comes in Brown, Black, Blond, and Clear, so there's truly a Boy Brow for everyone, though I'd love to see Glossier come out with tinted shade for redheads.
Beauty experts can't get enough of Glossier Boy Brow. When it first launched, it won an Allure Best of Beauty in 2016, was named a "game-changer" by Teen Vogue in 2015, and has been mentioned in countless other publications since then - including ours.
Pros: Natural finish, one-step brow product, works alone or over pomade/powder, four shades
Cons: Easy to apply too much product the first few times you use a fresh tube
Buy Boy Brow at Glossier for $16
The best brow powder
Shimmer in your brows sounds like a dystopian nightmare, but Kat Von D Brow Struck Dimension Powder is anything but a makeup disaster.
Shimmer is usually the last thing you think of when you hear the words "natural makeup," but it's is exactly what makes the Kat Von D Brow Struck Dimension Powder such a great pick.
Well, technically they're called "light-catching 3D pigments." But let's call a spade a spade - this is a brow powder with glitter in it.
The product is a two-in-one primer and powder that gives you long-lasting, natural-looking brows. Yes, natural. The shimmer gives each brow hair a dimensional realistic finish rather than making you look like the newest member of the touring circus. The concept actually makes sense, since real hair isn't usually one flat color.
Brow Struck Dimension Powder is vegan, cruelty-free, and comes in seven colors. Editors at PopSugar, Allure, and Cosmopolitan UK have all noted the surprisingly natural look of this light-catching powder.
Pros: Vegan, cruelty-free, comes in seven shades
Cons: Bulky compact , pricey
Buy Kat Von D Brow Struck Dimension Powder at Sephora for $21 (originally $20)
The best affordable brow pencil for less than $10
Some consider the NYX Micro Brow Pencil a very effective dupe for another popular - but way more expensive - brow pencil beloved by the beauty influencer community.
You've heard of Anastasia Beverly Hills Brow Wiz, right? Of course you have. People love it - but it's pricey. Luckily, the NYX Micro Brow Pencil is a convincing dupe and for less than $10 too. With more than 4,300 reviews on Ulta, it's a fan favorite in its own right.
On one side is a thin pencil that helps draw in brow hairs using ultra-fine strokes. The other end contains a built-in spoolie for combing brows into place and making sure the pencil is fully blended.
It's so similar to Brow Wiz that many of the Ulta reviews directly compare the two products. "Goes on and lasts exactly the same as a brand that costs double the price!" writes one fan. "Literally a cheaper Anastasia brow pencil with the exact same quality, not to mention it's half the price," says another.
It also has a superior shade range to many other top picks on the market, with eight colors ranging from Taupe to Black.
Writers and editors love the NYX pencil too. This product has been recommended by Cosmopolitan UK, Rank and Style, Influenster, and Allure.
Pros: Affordable, double-sided with pencil and spoolie, eight shades
Cons: Might be tough to find a shade match for non-brunette and darker hair colors
Buy the NYX Micro Brow Pencil at Ulta for $10 (originally $9.99)
The best brow tint
Don't have the patience to fill in your brows every morning? Wunderbrow is a temporary tint that stays put for up to three days.
Want really long-lasting brows? Wunderbrow is a semi-permanent tint that lasts up to three days. Imagine filling in your brows and not touching them again until Wednesday.
On the surface, this is a brow gel similar to every other one out there, with a fluffy spoolie that deposits the tint onto your brows and realistic hair fibers that help fill in any sparse spots. But the innovation comes through in the staying power, which lingers far longer due to the waterproof, smudge-proof, transfer-proof formula. When you're ready to remove, wash the area with an oil cleanser.
Of course, the downside is that if you typically use an oil cleanser, you won't get the temporary tint effect, but you can always adjust your cleansing routine if this is something you're interested in trying out.
Wunderbrow has more than 12,800 Amazon reviews and a 3.7 star rating. A couple of reviewers note there's a bit of a learning curve and that they prefer to apply with a brush rather than the spoolie it comes with, but most agree on the remarkable staying power.
"[T]his product is absolutely a god send and stays on for an amazingly 3 days! It's great. It's easy to take off. Just rub on some baby oil, rinse with soap and water, and it's gone. Waterproof, smudgeproof, sleep-proof, sweat-proof, anything-proof!" writes one fan.
Former Marie Claire beauty editor Chloe Metzger called it "perfect for anyone with commitment issues."
Pros: Long-lasting tint, fibers for thickness, budge-proof
Cons: Difficult to control the amount of product on the spoolie