The Complete Guide to Makeup for Men, According to Beauty Lab Experts (2025)

Over the past decade, the trend of men spending more time on grooming and personal care has only grown. According to a report by Future Market Insights, the color cosmetics market for men is currently valued at 17 billion dollars, and is expected to nearly triple by 2033. While paying more attention to your appearance, it's only natural to wonder about makeup as a means of sprucing up your looks.

As a guy who's never been good at getting much sleep and has eyebrows that are more implicit than tangible, I started wearing makeup when I was 18 as a way to give the impression that I was well-rested and had a meaner glare than my otherwise brow-less appearance suggests.

With thousands of products on the market, and even more tutorials and guides, figuring out where to start with makeup for men can be a daunting experience, and the learning curve for getting the "no-makeup-makeup" look that many men want deceptively steep. Luckily, the experts at the Good Housekeeping Institute have both the product know-how and years of makeup testing data to help you shop for, shade match and apply makeup like a pro.

How to choose makeup for men

A roadblock for many men wanting to try wearing makeup is knowing what products to use. If you're a beginner and just wanting to spruce up your appearance or look more awake, you only need a handful of products, and it doesn't need to cost a fortune. Start off by looking at your face and figuring out what you want to accomplish. Generally, I'd recommend starting off with a brow pencil, concealer and tinted moisturizer (on a case-by-case basis). When picking which products to use, there's a few things to keep in mind:

✔️ Coverage: Coverage is how opaque the makeup is, ranging from sheer to full. Sheer and light coverage products are forgiving for a couple of reasons. They tend to blend out with less effort, they look less detectable on the skin and if your shade match isn't 100% correct it won't show up as drastically. If you're a beginner, consider concealers like e.l.f's Putty Color-Correcting Eye Brightener or Fenty Beauty's Bright Fix Eye Brightener. These concealers offer slight coverage that doesn't look makeup-y on the skin, and can be blended easily with your fingers.

✔️ Finish: Makeup comes in a variety of finishes that can help achieve your desired look regardless of your skin type. Matte finish makeup can control shine for those with oily or combination skin. In a recent test of tinted moisturizers at the Good Housekeeping Institute, several testers with oily skin found that the bareMineral's Complexion Rescue Natural Matte Tinted Moisturizer controlled shine and made their skin appear smooth, another benefit to matte finish products.

Inversely, glowy or luminous makeup can provide dry skin with the moisture necessary to prevent the look of caking. In the same test of tinted moisturizers, a Good Housekeeping Beauty Awards winner, the Keys Soulcare It's Like Skin 2-In-1 Concealer + Tint was favored by testers for its natural, hydrating finish.

✔️ Shade: Complexion products tend to vary in shade by both depth and undertone. Depth refers to where the shade lies between very fair and very deep. Undertone refers to where the color lies on the warm and cool spectrum. In makeup, unlike in paint, "warm" typically refers to products with a yellow undertone, and "cool" to ones with pinker hues. "Neutral" products fall in the middle of these two ends.

Not sure where you fall? If your veins look green, you likely have warm undertones. If your veins appear blue or purple, you likely have cool undertones. If you see a mix of those colors, you might be neutral.

While it's good to know where you lie on both of these scales to help narrow down products, brands' terminology and shade classification systems are all unique, so the best way to find your match is to swatch it yourself in a store. If you're shopping online, many brands offer shade-finding tools or quizzes on their website that can help you narrow down your selection, though they vary in the quality of their recommendations.

How to apply makeup for men

✔️ Prep and prime: Makeup will always look best on skin that's been properly prepared. For men, this can mean a couple of things. Start off by washing your face, which gets rid of excess oil and sebum that can cause makeup to break up on your face sooner. If you plan on covering your beard or mustache area with product, a fresh, close shave will give you the smoothest canvas for application. Finish off your prep step with a hydrating moisturizer that will help blend smoothly on the skin.

✔️ Cover and correct: The most elementary application of makeup is hiding anything about your features you wish to conceal, but depending on what you're covering, the application can vary. When covering under-eye discoloration with concealer, try to focus your application on solely the areas that appear darker, and use scarce amounts of product on areas with lines or that crease when you smile.

Blend the concealer using a small, dense yet fluffy brush like the Real Techniques Expert Concealer Brush, using tapping motions. Blend the edges of where you put down the concealer first, and then blend the most concentrated application areas to keep the concealer focused exactly where you need it. Alternatively, use your pinky finger to blend in a similar manner if you're working without brushes to maintain that same level of precision.

If you're covering zits, apply a very tiny amount of high coverage concealer directly on the spot, blending with either your fingers or a brush. Trying to neutralize redness in a larger area of the face? Sparingly use a green color corrector on the most red spots — according to the color wheel, green will cancel out redness — then blend and apply a tinted moisturizer atop for a natural-looking neutralization. Tinted moisturizers provide just a hint of color to even out your complexion and can be applied with your fingers or a brush.

If your skin leans toward the oily side, setting any concealer you apply by dusting the application area with a loose powder with a makeup brush can elongate the wear of the concealer. Using smaller makeup brushes will give you more precision, and while it might take a little more time, it'll deliver a more undetectable final product.

✔️ Emphasize and enhance: Perhaps the most fun part of makeup is deciding what you want to do with your face now that you've prepared a perfect canvas. There are no rules to this part, so in lieu of an instructive guide, take the following as ideas you can choose to adopt or ignore depending on what works for you.

A more defined brow can make you appear younger or more awake, and give structure to your face. For natural-looking brow enhancement, look for brow pencils with ultra-fine tips for creating hair-like strokes. Additionally, look for brow pencils that feature a wide range of shades and tones, like the Fenty Beauty Brow MVP, so you can ensure a seamless blend with your real hairs. To apply, simply draw hair-like strokes where your natural brows appear sparse, most frequently at the tails.

Placing contour under the frontmost part of your brows, the hollows of your cheeks, and jawbone can give your face a more masculine, gaunt look. Contouring is makeup technique that adds dimension and helps sculpt the face by using colors that are slightly darker or lighter than your natural skin color.

A little blush focused more towards the center and higher planes of the face (as opposed to the applies of the cheeks) can give you a youthful flush without pulling your features outward in a feminine way. Cream products tend to be easier to blend (you can use your fingers) and look more natural for this step — just make sure to not apply powder until all of your cream and liquid products are laid down.

Clear mascara like Maybelline's Great Lash is fantastic for not only opening up the eyes and taming unruly brows, but also for shaping your mustache or beard, and a colored brow gel like the Benefit Cosmetics Gimme Brow+ Tinted Volumizing Eyebrow Gel (a GH Beauty, Health and Sustainability Lab expert favorite) can give a little more oomf to your facial hair if it's sparse in some areas.

Whatever you choose to incorporate into your routine, remember to have fun with it and not be afraid to experiment. In an endless sea of tutorials on TikTok and YouTube, it's important to remember that not every technique or product will work for everyone, and it's ultimately about what makes you look — and feel — good.