Acne affects tens of millions of people in the United States alone, making it the most common skin concern. It has a variety of causes, which can make finding the right treatment difficult.
However, while you’re finding the best treatment for your acne, if you feel insecure, you have other options too!
Concealer is one of the best ways to cover your acne.
They’re either full or buildable coverage, and many even have ingredients to help treat your acne while you wear it. You can also find colored concealers to help color correct while you wear them.
As a result, acne concealers aren’t created equal and picking the right one for you can be difficult.
That’s why we’ve created a list of the top 15 best concealers for acne. Not only that, however, but we’ve also gathered some of our top tips and advice to help make sure you’re as happy as possible with your concealer.
Top 15 Best Concealers for Acne:
1. Glo Skin Beauty Oil-Free Concealer
If full coverage isn’t what you’re looking for, then you may want to consider Glo Skin Beauty’s concealer.
This concealer has medium coverage. While it may not be studier enough to last all day, you can top it with setting powder to improve its longevity.
You can also build the concealer if needed, working your way up to full coverage.
It’s oil-free to help prevent excessive greasiness as well as help keep your pores from getting clogged. In order to help improve your skin while covering discoloration, acne, and scars, it uses a unique blend of Vitamins A, C, E and Green Tea Extract.
Expert Advice: Due to its medium coverage and lightweight formula, you can also use this concealer as a primer for your eyelids. Simply apply to your eyes before doing your makeup to improve color, texture, and help aid in preventing fading/rubbing off.
2. Dermablend Quick-Fix Full Coverage Concealer
This full-coverage acne concealer provides a natural finish that’s safe even on sensitive skin. The easy to apply stick makes covering everything from acne to dark spots a breeze.
It’s non-drying, and, when you use the Dermablend setting powder, it can last up to 16 hours. That’s nearly a fully day of feeling your absolute best.
Application is easy, making this a popular quick-fix acne concealer. Rather than have to pull out all your brushes and sponges, simply glide the stick over the area and warm the concealer with your fingers to blend.
This also helps prevent dryness, keeping you from looking cakey or crepey, even if you have fine lines.
Just note that this concealer does use ingredients such as mineral oils and talc.
3. It Cosmetics Bye Bye Breakout Concealer
Do more than cover up your acne with It Cosmetics’ Bye Bye Breakout concealer. Formulated with the help of plastic surgeons, this concealer works to both cover up acne while drying out problem bumps.
This works to heal acne faster while still allowing you to cover any areas you may feel insecure about so that you can feel your best.
This full-coverage concealer is safe for oily and acne-prone skin, and it covers blemishes, redness, and dark spots without caking or creasing. Plus, to help you achieve your healthiest skin, it’s infused with an abundance of beneficial ingredients.
Expert Advice: Want the best results with this concealer? Try applying it with a brush and experimenting with setting powers. You can try setting sprays too!
4. Make Up For Ever Full Cover Concealer
This concealer lives up to its name with a long-lasting, waterproof formula. As a result, you’ll get all-day wear with full coverage.
The Make Up For Ever concealer uses a high concentration of pigments to help provide full coverage on your face as well as other places on your body. At the same time, though, it maintains a soft and creamy formula that’s oil-free for a matte finish.
This concealer has been clinically tested to be gentle on sensitive skin, an added bonus.
It’s designed to cover up scars, hyperpigmentation, major discoloration, burns, and tattoos. It also works as an acne concealer.
It comes in 20 different shades, providing a large variety so that you can find your perfect skin match.
5. MAC Studio Finish Concealer
Whether you want an acne concealer or a tattoo concealer or just a concealer to cover up the occasional blemish or dark spot, one thing will never change. And that one thing is the fact you want to treat your skin, bare-faced or wearing makeup.
The MAC Studio Finish concealer is perfect for that.
It’s fragrance-free, designed to be non-clogging, and has buildable coverage. Plus, it’s formulated with skin healthy ingredients such as Vitamin A and Vitamin E.
In order to help protect your skin from damage, it also features SPF 35 protection.
The concealer has a creamy, soft texture that is easy to blend into your skin for all-day coverage that is water-resistant and looks great.
6. Tarte Double Duty Beauty Shape Tape Concealer
Double Duty Beauty Shape Tape Contour Concealer is a vegan, super-blendable formula that instantly helps brighten, smooth and give the skin a firmer, more lifted look. It offers full coverage concealing that has a matte finish to help keep your skin from creasing or looking greasy.
Plus, if you’re going for a minimalist, capsule makeup bag, this acne concealer doubles as a contouring and highlighting product.
The formula is designed to be easy to blend without any excessive greasiness or creasing. This allows for smooth, flawless coverage.
It also illuminates. This helps give your skin a healthy glow with lifting abilities for skin that isn’t just covered from problem areas but also fights signs of aging.
Just be wary of picking the right color for your skin. This concealer may run a little lighter than advertised, so you’ll want to double-check your shade as well as reviews.
7. Almay Clear Complexion Concealer
Covering blemish with an acne concealer can be a short term solution for a potentially long term problem. That’s why it’s important to pick a concealer that doesn’t just hide blemishes but actively fights against them and works to prevent them.
This is why, when it comes to acne concealers, you may just find that the Almay Clear Complexion concealer is your best choice.
This concealer contains a strong dose of salicylic acid. This ingredient, a dermatologist favorite, helps treat acne and improve your skin complexion.
It’s dermatologist-tested to be hypoallergenic, fragrance-free, and non-comedogenic. As a result, it covers, fights, and prevents all while staying gentle on even sensitive skin.
There are six different shades available. Each one blends seamlessly and provides a matte finish to help you feel your best.
8. Kevyn Aucoin Sensual Skin Enhancer Foundation
Looking for the all-in-one product of your dreams? This product by Kevyn Aucoin acts as an acne concealer, all-over foundation, spot foundation, and highlighter.
As a result, you can get more results with less products, saving you time, space, and money.
It’s formulated with ingredients such as honey and jojoba oil which work to keep your skin soft to the touch while also improving texture and complexion. As a result, your skin can look and feel better, with or without makeup.
This finish is luminous and dewy without excessive greasiness or shine. Plus, there are several shades available so that you can find your perfect skin match.
Expert Advice: Prone to greasiness throughout the day but still want the benefits of this concealer? No worries! Put a small amount onto the back of your hand and apply it with a makeup brush. Then, smooth it across your face with a beauty sponge. To help reduce greasiness, you can top it with a small amount of translucent setting powder or a mattifying setting spray.
9. Clinique Acne Solutions Clearing Concealer
Looking for another option for acne concealers that clears while it covers? Look no further than Clinique’s Acne Solutions concealer.
We’ve already told you about the acne-fighting, skin healing benefits of salicylic acid. It promotes skin to heal, acts as an anti-inflammatory, and is also included in this concealer.
On top of healing your skin problems while helping provide coverage, this concealer also acts as a primer. This helps keep your makeup looking fresh without patches while keeping you from buying several products.
Related: Best Primers for Acne Prone Skin
Minimalistic and budget-friendly!
One of the biggest issues, however, is the fact it only has three shades. This can make finding the perfect match and coverage for you can be difficult.
10. Lancome Paris Teint Idole Ultra Wear Camouflage Concealer
This ultra-pigmented, full-coverage concealer is designed to camouflage imperfections such as acne without weighting your skin down. It’s designed to go further with less and is advertised to only take one drop to cover your face.
Related: Best Face Masks for Acne
The best way to apply this acne concealer is to squeeze a small amount – a pea-sized amount goes far – onto the back of your hand. After using your fingers to warm it up, apply it with your favorite applicator.
You can use anything! Your fingers (although not recommended by makeup artists), sponges, brushes, etc. all work.
11. First Aid Beauty Bendy Avocado Concealer
With over ten shades, finding your perfect match just got a little easier with the First Aid Beauty avocado concealer. It ranges from ivory over 11 shades to deep, providing the perfect color for almost everyone.
This flexible, vegan concealer provides buildable, weightless coverage with avocado to help hydrate and nourish the skin. It’s designed to stretch and move with your skin for all-day blending and coverage without creasing and patchiness.
On top of being vegan and safe for sensitive skin, it’s made with skin-healthy ingredients such as avocado oil, Vitamin E, mushroom extracts, and caffeine. These hydrate, condition, soothe, and help diminish the appearance of undereye puffiness and dark circles.
It’s suitable for all skin types with clinically proven results.
12. Kat Von D Lock-It Concealer Creme
Cruelty-free and designed to be full coverage, this acne cream is maximum strengthened to erase problem areas while also offering benefits. It’s smooth and thick, making it easy to spread.
Related: Best Cruelty-Free Concealers
With that being said, however, there are a few important things to keep in mind.
First, this is a thick creme. While this is great for dryer skin that’s prone to cakiness, crepe texture, or flakes, it can be detrimental to oily skin types.
Related: Best Concealers for Dry Skin
A little also goes a long way. This makes this a long-lasting product since you only need to use a little to achieve desirable coverage.
13. Huda Beauty Overachiever Concealer
Huda Beauty has been a popular makeup brand for many years now. Due to this, you’ll be able to find a multitude of reviews and tutorials online featuring this acne concealer.
Expert Advice: Unless you have extremely oily skin or are using a thick creamy concealer, make sure to moisturize before applying an acne concealer. This can help with blending while protecting your skin.
14. Maybelline Brightening Concealer
This full-coverage under eye concealer is waterproof, transfer and smudge resistant, and lasts for up to 24 hours. It features a precise paddle applicator that glides this high-coverage concealer onto the skin for a seamless, even finish.
It also comes in 12 different shades so that you can find the option that works best for you.
While it’s designed for dark circles, it can also work well on acne. Especially acne scars that have led to discoloration.
Expert Advice: While covering acne is important, preventing it is even more so. One of the leading causes of acne is dirty tools, so make sure to clean the included application paddle occasionally.
15. Pat McGrath Concealer
A creamy, lightweight, full-coverage concealer with a natural, radiant-matte finish that brightens under the eye and hides the appearance of blemishes. It’s also designed to take into account things such as undertones so you can the absolute best skin match.
Check also:
- Best Drugstore Toners for Acne Prone Skin
- Best Pillowcases for Acne Prone Skin
- Best Face Self Tanner for Acne Prone Skin
- Best Cocoa Butters for Acne Scars
Joan S. Wilson is a lifelong makeup and skincare enthusiast. She used to work as a makeup artist for 5 years. Joan is always curious and wants to learn more when it comes to makeup and skincare. She tries her best to make other people’s skin health better. This is why Joan is so passionate about writing articles on beauty topics. She always looks for products that are high-quality, dermatologist-tested, and does that it says on the label. In every article, she shares her knowledge to make your life healthier and happier!