Which? report contests anti-wrinkle claims for eye creams

Consumer magazine Which? has issued a report claiming that expensive eye creams don’t make much of a difference when it comes to reducing the appearance of wrinkles and that cheaper moisturisers may perform better. A study into the efficacy of anti-wrinkle eye creams conducted by Which? used volunteers aged between 35-36 to test 12 anti-wrinkle eye products, with each cream tested on between nine and 11 people during a six-week period. Five expert panellists then assessed high-definition photographs of the volunteers’ eye areas taken before using the products, one hour after and six weeks later to see whether there had been any visible improvement in wrinkle length and depth.

The anti-wrinkle eye cream that performed the best was Nivea Visage Anti-Wrinkle Q10 Plus Eye Cream (£9.99 for 15ml), while the eye version of RoC Retin-Ox Intensive Anti Wrinkle Cream (£19.95 for 15ml), which will be discontinued in September, was felt to be the least effective. The low-budget control product, Simple Kind to Skin Replenishing Rich Moisturiser (£3.21 for 125ml), outperformed StriVectin-SD, the most expensive product tested, which costs £47 for 40ml.

But while the study found that none of the products tested came close to eliminating or reducing the appearance of wrinkles, it found that treatments containing retinoids exhibited the best lab evidence of wrinkle repair.