Worth it? Tarte Shape Tape Concealer

Tarte Shape Tape, $25

Holy heavily-promoted-on-YouTube, Batman! I eventually bought Shape Tape to weigh in on it to see if it was ridiculous YouTube sponsored hype or a legitimately good product. This cruelty-free, apparently vegan product is evidently sold once every twenty-six seconds according to Tarte’s site.

Availability

When Tarte Shape Tape came out, it was basically out of stock in all popular shades, including mine, for what seemed like months. I suspect this is due to a bit of manufactured scarcity to pump up demand and hype. Eventually, I got my hands on a tube during a Ulta 20% Platinum Perk sale.

I didn’t realize this at first, but Tarte Shape Tape is only sold on tarte.com and at Ulta. I learned that Tarte seems to offer 20% off promotions more often than Ulta does, but then you lose your point/perk earning potential. Pros and cons, people.

Shades

I purchased Light Neutral because that’s what I wear in their Airbrush Full Coverage foundation. I find it pulls a little to the pink side of neutral (whereas the foundation pulls a bit yellow!), but only slightly…and not noticeably unless someone is spending WAY too much time scrutinizing your face.

As far as the range goes, Tarte Shape Tape comes in fourteen shades, but only 2-3 options for women of color. Light-to-medium skin tons have a ton of options.

Application

Okay, this is the first significant complaint I have about this product. This wand is positively ridiculous. It’s a doefoot applicator on steroids. Doefoot wands work fine for plenty of concealers (including NARS Radiant Creamy which is lovely!) but this oversized one is awkward. There is no way you will get a reasonable amount of product on it; in fact, if you used the wand as I assume Tarte intends, you’d be using this as foundation.You see YouTubers generously swiping it on their faces; it leaves me thinking, “WTF are you doing?” It was designed for use as a contouring product but frankly, doing so seems like an awful lot of work.

The gigantic wand just doesn’t work for under-eye or spot-concealing application, which is what I need. Instead, I swipe a small amount on the back of my hand and apply using a brush or BeautyBlender from there.

Tarte Shape Tape dries quickly, so you don’t have as much blend time as you do with, say, a NARS Radiant Creamy ($29). You have slightly MORE time than MAC Pro Longwear ($22) however.

Stephanie Marie of YouTube offers some good tips on how to apply this if you’re a regular human rather than YouTube or Insta-famous.

Wear

• Oxidation: I did not find Tarte Shape Tape to oxidize poorly through 12+ hours of wear.
• Drying: Shape Tape did feel a bit drying on days where I was dry to begin with. Not moreso than Pro Longwear.
• Creasing: I’m realistic and accept some degree of creasing. I found this to crease less than NARS.
• Coverage: Coverage was higher than NARS Radiant Creamy, and comparable to MAC Pro Longwear.

The Bottom Line

I’d recommend Tarte Shape Tape. It is fairly priced in comparison to competitive products I’ve tried. I don’t like the scarcity issue or the limited range of colors; women of color are under-represented in the beauty marketplace and although I am personally not limited by this, I empathize.

Overall, I think I like it more than MAC Pro Longwear, and slightly more than NARS Radiant Creamy. Since such small amount(s) go such a long way, it is reasonably priced for what you get even off sale; I go through Maybelline Instant Age Rewind far faster than I seem to be going through Shape Tape. Like everything else, if I can get a better price I’m going to wait until Platinum and VIB sales to get it.