Updated: 11/21/22

With so many brands and shades to choose from, picking the right foundation shade can be incredibly tricky. Fortunately, a good foundation match app (for ios and Android) can cut down on the guesswork and help you find the perfect foundation shade.

But are these foundation match apps accurate? We put the top 5 foundation match apps to the test and find out if they truly work.

Foundation Matching

Are you looking for a foundation matching app? Our foundation matcher and shade finders have swatches and photos of people with various skin tones that make foundation matching quick and accurate.

Find Your Foundation Shade — Foundation Matcher: Find Your Foundation Match in different brands

Foundation and concealer shade finders — Foundation/concealer shade finders

Alternatively, skip to the next section to see our reviews of the top 5 foundation match apps.

Apps We Tested

Findation
Redmond Mom Foundation Matcher
Temptalia Foundation Matrix
Sephora Find My Shade
Slapp

Our Verdict

We recommend using more than one foundation matching app to get accurate results.
Findation gave us somewhat accurate shade matches, but you’ll need to confirm the results with another foundation matcher.
Redmond Mom has photos of people wearing the foundation shades and a useful foundation matcher that is sorted by skin tones. This foundation matcher’s shade database gave us accurate shade matches.
Avoid these apps:
- Sephora Find My Shade (not accurate and limited to only products sold at Sephora)
- Temptalia Foundation Matrix (too bloated with ads and provided ambiguous results)
- Slapp (not useful at all)

1. Findation

Use this if: you want a shade-matching app with an easy-to-use web interface.

Summary: Findation comes highly recommended, but during our tests, we found it limited. It did not provide the shade info for the product we were seeking. It did, however, provide the shade info for another foundation made by the same brand.

Is it accurate: Somewhat accurate, but Findation’s limited database may not have the foundation you are seeking.

Test 1: We used L’Oreal Tru Match foundation in shade W2 as our guide to see if Findation could find a match for the IT Cosmetics CC+ Cream. It did not find a shade for the CC+ Cream but it did provide a shade match for another IT Cosmetics foundation (Celebration Foundation) in Light.

Findation listed only one type of IT Cosmetics foundation. It wasn’t the CC+ Cream we were after, but the shade range was similar and we were able to make it work.

Test 2: Using the same L’Oreal foundation, we tried to find a shade equivalent for the Shiseido Sun Protection Compact. Unfortunately, Findation did not have the product we were seeking. The only Shiseido foundation listed on the site was Shiseido’s Perfect Refining Foundation, which had a different shade range and naming convention. Ultimately, it was not useful to us at all.

Findation did not provide the foundation we were seeking. Its closest match was another foundation made by Shiseido that has a different shade range and naming convention. Ultimately, it was not useful for us

Verdict: Findation’s results are not always accurate and its database is limited, hence you may not find the foundation you are seeking.

2. Redmond Mom Foundation Matcher

Use this if: you want to see how the foundation shade looks like on real people. This is the only foundation matcher that is sorted by images of people of various skin tones, which makes finding the correct shade super easy. Additionally, if you know your MAC foundation shade, it’s easy to find shade equivalents for other foundations and concealers quickly.

Summary: Redmond Mom’s Foundation Matcher database is listed by MAC foundation shades. The foundation types and shade matches are displayed in tables, along with reviews of the product by makeup bloggers.

Is it accurate: Yes. We found correct shades for the foundations we were searching for.

Redmond Mom Foundation Matcher provided accurate shade info in both tests.

Test 1: Our tester’s shade is MAC NC15, and on the NC15 page, we entered “L’Oreal” into the table search bar and found that it was the correct shade (W2). On the same table, we also found the correct IT Cosmetics CC+ Cream shade (Light).

Redmond Mom Foundation Matcher found us the correct match for Shiseido Sun Protection Compact.

Test 2: We entered “Shiseido” into the table search box and found that it contained the correct shade info for the foundation we wanted (Shiseido Sun Protection Compact).

Verdict: this is the only foundation matcher with images of people of various skin tones, which makes finding the correct shade quick and easy.

3. Temptalia Foundation Matrix

Use this if: you need images and swatches to help you pick the right shade. Warning: lots of ads.

Summary: At first glance, Temptalia Foundation Matrix looks like a full-featured site with an extensive database of foundation shades and swatches. After testing the site however, we found it bloated with useless info and impossible to pin down the correct shade.

Is it accurate: Not really; results were ambiguous and unhelpful.

Test 1: We used the same L’Oreal Tru Match foundation shade as a guide and searched for a match for IT Cosmetics CC+ Cream. Temptalia provided 3 different shades (Fair, Light and Neutral Medium), which wasn’t useful at all since we were after a definitive shade match.

Temptalia Foundation Matrix said we were matched to 3 different shades for IT Cosmetics CC+ Cream, which wasn’t helpful.

Test 2: Using the same L’Oreal foundation, we searched for a shade match for Shiseido Sun Protection Compact. Again, it listed 3 different shade options (SP20, SP30 and SP40) as our best matches, which was not helpful.

Instead of giving us one definitive shade, Temptalia Foundation Matrix gave us 3 different shade options, which was not useful at all.

Verdict: the website is cluttered and bloated. Instead of providing a definitive shade, it provides multiple shade options which isn’t helpful if you are trying to find the right shade.

4. Sephora Find My Shade

Use this if: you are shopping on Sephora’s website and want a quick way to verify that you have selected the correct shade.

Summary: Sephora’s foundation shade finder is a stand in for the times when you can’t get to the Sephora store in person to get shade-matched. Like other shade apps, you select the foundation brand and shade you already use, and it matches you to the foundations sold on Sephora.

Is it accurate: Not really.

Test 1: We used L’Oreal TruMatch in W2 to find a shade equivalent for IT Cosmetics CC+ Cream, and Sephora was unable to find a match for us.

Sephora’s Find My Shade was not able to find a shade match for us for the IT Cosmetics CC+ Cream.

Test 2: Sephora does not carry Shiseido Sun Compact and we were not able to perform a shade match for that product.

Verdict: your shade matches are limited to what’s sold on Sephora.com. In other words, if you are looking to get shade-matched to brands like Maybelline, Revlon or The Ordinary (makeup), you won’t find what you need.

5. Slapp

Use this if: you want to experiment with using selfies to find personalized makeup products.

Is it accurate: No. It’s a great concept using selfies to determine one’s foundation match, but ultimately it did not accurately match our tester’s skin tone to the correct foundation shade.

Test 1: After downloading and installing the Slapp app, we signed up for a Slapp account to access the app. Our tester took a selfie and tried to use the app to find foundation matches. We filtered the search results for IT Cosmetics and the app did not find the product (IT Cosmetics CC+ Cream) we were after. The only IT Cosmetics foundation available is the IT Cosmetics Foundation and the app matched our tester to Tan Neutral 42. Unfortunately, this is many shades darker than our tester’s skin tone.

Slapp app’s foundation matching algorithm was off – it was many shades darker than our tester’s skin tone.

Test 2: Next, we filtered the search results for “Shiseido” and found only a sunblock product.

Slapp app had only a Shiseido sunblock product listed.

Verdict: The app did not find an accurate foundation match for our tester.

How We Tested

We performed 2 tests on every app to check the accuracy of the foundation match apps.

Test 1: using L’Oreal TruMatch in shade W2, Light Ivory, we searched for a shade equivalent for IT Cosmetics CC+ Cream (the correct shade for our tester is Light).

Test 2: Next, using the same L’Oreal foundation shade, we searched for another shade equivalent for Shiseido Sun Protection Compact (the correct shade for our tester is SP 30).

Note: we used these 3 different foundations because we know how the shade looks like on our tester’s skin (MAC NC15) and because it comes in both liquid and powder forms.

Thanks for reading our roundup of the 5 best foundation apps!

Foundation Matching for All Brands

If you are looking for your foundation/concealer match, check out our foundation matcher, the world’s most extensive user-driven foundation shade database.