E.L.F. 16HR Camo Concealer Review & Swatches
I’m going to the bad guy and give E.L.F. 16HR Camo Concealer a bad review. Go ahead, throw tomatoes at me, boo me, hiss at me, I’m going to try to take it without sobbing 🙂
E.L.F. 16HR Camo Concealer is currently be hauled across youTube as a Tarte Shape Tape dupe. It’s a highly pigmented concealer available in 18 shade selections that will set you back a mere $5 bucks each. Impressive right? Five bucks for a Shape Tape Concealer dupe? Sign me up!
It promises full-coverage in a long-wearing formula that has a creamy formula which can be used to conceal imperfections such as dark circles. I admit I was pretty excited about this even though my past experiences with E.L.F. Concealers hasn’t be great. I have tired, puffy eyes and I really rely on my concealer to brighten them up and conceal my puffiness! Typically, I’m all about pigmented, full-coverage concealers even though I like my foundation formulas lighter and sheerer.
This seemed like a great pick up and the price was brilliant.
E.L.F. 16HR Camo Concealer does indeed aim itself as being a Shape Tape Concealer dupe as it comes housed in the same chunky barrel with the oversized sponge applicator. For five dollars you get 0.2 oz of concealer. Shape Tape is larger at 0.33 oz but way more expensive as well at $27.
Aside from the packaging I wouldn’t call it a Shape Tape Concealer dupe. I use Shape Tape, I like Shape Tape, and I’m not feeding into the Tarte frenzy here when I say that I think it’s a great product. It’s also a surprising one since I have dry eyes and I’m always looking for a hydrating concealer. Shape Tape is matte as hell but still it manages to work for me.
That being said, 16HR Camo Concealer has the same characteristics as Tarte’s formula but it just doesn’t work for me.
First off, this shade range is weird to me. I did blind buy four shades and three of the four were were SUPER pale. I noticed that in promo images but thought nothing of it as I just figured the promo images were off but believe me the paleness of the shades is a real thing. What I can’t figure out is how people on youTube are reviewing this and not looking like ghosts. I watched a girl that appeared to have a skin tone that was about three times darker than my own applying one of the shades I purchased and it look really natural on her. I applied it and looked like Casper the pissed off concealer ghost. We the Unicorns had posted a photo of Jeffree Star, James Charles, and Jaclyn Hill that had a good deal of flashback in it and might have been photoshopped by someone to look bad. Anyway, that’s PRETYY much what I look like when I’m wearing this concealer! Really chalky, really pasty, just really bad flashback without the flash haha!
The shade names are highly misleading. Medium Peach, nothing peach here and nothing medium either. It’s more of a pale, pasty cream shade with a hint of a yellow undertone. Medium Sand, nothing medium or sandy here either. Medium Beige, that should have been a good pick for me or at least some sort of Light Medium. This was fair too orange toned but hey, at least not pale phew! The first ten shades appear to run very, very, very, very light. I haven’t seen them in stores mind you but based on the ones I purchased these would be great for Snow White skin tones but not my own. It’s great if you’re a person with a very fair complexion who struggles to find a foundation or a concealer shade but anyone in a light medium shade range might struggle with some of the shades.
To me, this is Instagram makeup. If you do a lot of heavy contouring under your eyes and you sort of even things out with foundation plus bronzer this formula might work out great for you. But an average, everyday makeup user like me, not so much!
As for the formula, it’s interesting and it showed promise but isn’t without faults. This is a very thick, creamy texture much like Shape Tape. It felt a little creamier compared to Shape Tape but it applied and blended poorly. It sets very quickly which didn’t give me a lot of time to blend it. This resulted in a bit of patchiness and it automatically migrates right into the finer lines under my eyes and starts to crease within seconds of application and blending. I don’t have crow’s feet or laugh lines at the corners of my eyes but this stuff cracks and makes it look like I do. I tend to blend up toward that area when I apply my concealer and this dried and just started to crack and looked awful. I have drier skin and the matte finish just wasn’t working for me. Perhaps if you’re more oily you won’t experience these issues. The wear time felt like a cop out since it started cracking and creasing within the first few minutes and the formula just migrated deeper into my finer lines as time went by. At the end of the night I looked like I had streaks of off color concealer under my eyes. It just didn’t match up with my skin or my foundation that I had applied.
After testing and wearing this out for nearly two whole weeks I think almost everyone I know told me I looked tired or I looked really pale.
$5 is a great deal and there’s no doubt E.L.F. really made an effort to make 16HR Camo Concealer into some sort of Shape Tape duplication but as a girl with drier skin and finer lines under my eyes this just didn’t work out. Not to mention the shade range just seems wayyyyyyyyyy off to me. It might work better as a concealer on your face but I didn’t test it as such since I don’t use concealer on my face but for under eye use, avoid it.
Have you tried E.L.F. 16HR Camo Concealer?
I’m really curious to hear what others think!
Where to buy
E.L.F. 16HR Camo Concealer is a new, permanent matte full-coverage concealer that’s an obvious nod to Tarte’s cult-favorite Shape Tape Concealer. It’s a mere $5 in price and 0.2 oz in size and comes in 18 shade selections. I think E.L.F. did a fairly good job with the thick, creamy texture but sadly, it sets to quickly and gives little time to blend well which for me resulted in creasing and patchiness as well as a drier look around my eyes. The color range seems to run really, really light and I couldn’t get down a good match for myself from the shades I purchased which resulted in a very pasty, chalky look.
- Very affordable.
- Very nice creamy texture.
- Sets to quickly, no time to blend well.
- Creases within minutes of application.
- Looks cracked and patchy within minutes of application.
- Very weird shade range that runs very, very light.
E.L.F. 16HR Camo Concealer might be better left to the contouring wizards and makeup geniuses out there that know how to highlighter, contour, and apply super light concealer in a way it looks natural. It might also be a suitable for younger or oily skin.