Is the "Clean at Sephora" Label Just Greenwashing? Let’s Break It Down.

With more consumers transitioning to non-toxic products, an increasing number of retailers are coming up with their own “clean” labels. There’s “Target Clean,” Ulta’s “Conscious Beauty” collection, and even Amazon has their “Amazon Aware” label.

When there’s no standard definition of “clean” or “non-toxic” or even “natural,” each brand or retailer has to come up with their own specific standards for safer products. Some of those standards are more strict than others. Consumers like you and me will have to analyze each standard and decide for ourselves whether or not we will trust that specific label.

So in this article, I’m breaking down the pros and cons of the “Clean at Sephora” label so that you can decide if you want to buy from their “clean” collection or not.

What this guide covers:

“Clean at Sephora” Is An Evolving Label
What “Clean at Sephora” DOES Mean
What “Clean at Sephora” Does NOT Mean
The “Planet Aware” Collection
My Personal Take
Pros & Cons of the “Clean at Sephora” Label (In a Nutshell!)
A Few “Clean at Sephora” Products I Would Buy

This guide contains product recommendations and we may receive compensation if you purchase through certain links. As always, we only make recommendations that are genuine!

“Clean at Sephora” Is An Evolving Label

The first version of “Clean at Sephora”, which was launched in 2018, was pretty weak. It only included about 13 banned ingredients (and the company was criticized for it).

Then in 2019, it got an upgrade. It now includes over 30 banned ingredients, plus even more that are restricted.

In 2021, they banned intentionally-added PFAS in product formulations.

In 2022, they added some more restrictions, such as limits on 1,4 dioxane and ethylene oxide contamination in ethoxylated ingredients.

In 2026 it’s getting yet another upgrade, this time involving the packaging. Effective December 31, 2025, all PFAS, bisphenols, silver salts, and mineral oils will be banned from packaging used in “Clean at Sephora” products.

All of the info below is accurate at the time of publication, but I’m assuming Sephora will continue updating their standards to keep up with scientific literature. So if you’re reading this in the future, don’t hesitate to re-check their standards to see if anything has changed!

What “Clean at Sephora” DOES Mean

Sephora has two main ‘conscious’ collections: “Clean at Sephora,” which is focused on ingredient safety and “Planet Aware,” which is more focused on environmental sustainability characteristics (such as reduced packaging).

Products can be a part of one or the other collection, or be included in both. If the product is in both collections, you’ll see a combined logo like the third one shown here:

The photo shows three circular labels with different eco-friendly symbols and messages, set against a blue sky background.

First let’s look at the “Clean at Sephora” standards.

In order to qualify for the “Clean at Sephora” label, the following ingredients are prohibited:

Acetaldehyde
Acetonitrile
Acetone
Acrylates
Aluminum Salts
Benzophenones and related compounds
Bisphenol A (BPA)
Butoxyethanol
Butylated hydroxyanisole (BHA)
Coal tar
Ethanolamines
Formaldehyde or formaldehyde releasing agents
Hydroquinone
Methoxyethanol or methyl cellosolve
Methylene chloride
Methylchloroisothiazolinone and methylisothiazolinone
Parabens
Phthalates
Resorcinol
Retinyl palmitate
Styrene
Sulfates
Toluene
Triclosan and triclocarban
Octinoxate and Octocrylene
PFAS
Nitromusks and polycyclic musks
EDTA and derivatives
Mineral oil and derivatives

Additionally, these ingredients are prohibited as intentionally-added ingredients and have max limits on how much contamination is allowed:

Ethylene oxide: Max limit is less than 2 ppm for lip products and less then 7 ppm for all other products.)
Lead and lead acetate: Max limits in total formula must be less than 0.5 ppm for lip products, 10 ppm for all other products.
Mercury and mercury compounds (thimerisol): Max limit in total formula must be less than 1 ppm.
1,4 dioxane: Max limit of 10 ppm or less for rinse-off products and 3 ppm or less for leave-on products in final version.
Cyclic silicones: Max limit < 0.1% as technically unavoidable impurity only (cannot be intentionally added).
Benzene: Maximum threshold at 1mg/kg i.e. 0.001%
Butylated hydroxytoluene (BHT): Max limit < 0.1% as an incidental in the final formula only.

The following ingredients are not prohibited, but they are restricted:

Acrylamide and polyacrylamide: Must meet impurity limits as defined by EU regulation in Annex 111/66 as follows: a) Body products without rinsing: Max residual acrylamide content 0.1 mg/kg b) Other products: Max residual acrylamide content 0.5 mg/kg
Acrylates: Impurity limits: < 250 ppm acrylic acid, < 150 ppm methylmethacrylate, < 250 ppm in total monomers
Benzalkonium chloride: Restricted to 0.1% or less of total formula
Phenoxyethanol: Must be 1% or less of total formula
Talc: Only talc with no detection of asbestos according to the raw material specification can be used
Synthetic Fragrance: Synthetic fragrance is restricted and only allowed providing it meets the full Clean at Sephora list requirements and is under 1% of the total formula in skincare, body care, makeup, and hair products.
Other heavy metals: Impurity limits: Arsenic—47 ppm or mg/kg, Cadmium—17 ppm or mg/kg, Chromium VI—8 ppm or mg/kg
Nanomaterials: Limits on nano MBBT, titanium dioxide, zinc oxide, and carbon black according to EU standards.

As I mentioned above, Sephora also has added some packaging standards, which will go into effect December 31, 2025. These standards will prohibit PFAS, bisphenols, silver salts, and mineral oils in packaging.

What “Clean at Sephora” Does NOT Mean

Overall, I would say the prohibited/restricted list above is pretty good! But let’s look at some potentially problematic ingredients that were left off:

Other bisphenols: BPA is prohibited, but that’s just one type of bisphenol. I am glad to see that all bisphenols will be prohibited from packaging by 2026 though! (BPA is usually more of a concern for packaging than the actual cosmetic product anyway.)

Other chemical sunscreens: Octinoxate, octocrylene, and oxybenzone are prohibited, but there are a couple of other chemical sunscreens (like homosalate and avobenzone) that also come with problems and I’d personally like to see prohibited as well.

Ethoxylated ingredients: As a reminder, ethoxylated ingredients aren’t problematic in and of themselves. Rather, because of the way they are manufactured, they can contain residual contaminants of ethylene oxide and/or 1,4 dioxane (which are carcinogens). Ethoxylated ingredients are very common, so it’s difficult to avoid them completely, but minimizing them when possible can be a good thing.

“Clean at Sephora” doesn’t explicitly ban ethoxylated ingredients. Instead, they put restrictions on how much ethylene oxide and 1,4 dioxane is allowed in the product. Sephora says they require brands to test to make sure any contamination is below the levels listed above. However, Sephora is not clear on the details of the testing requirements. Is it a one-time test, or annual? Do they test multiple products, or just one? I’d like to see some more transparency on the processes involved here.

Undisclosed ‘fragrance/parfum’ or ‘flavor/aroma’: They do still allow for undisclosed “fragrance”, meaning the brands do not have to list out all of the fragrance ingredients in their products. They do have to list all fragrance allergens (which is the standard law now anyway), and they also have to be free from the other ingredients on the banned list. That means you don’t have to worry about things like phthalates or nitromusks, which is good. But I do still like to see full fragrance transparency.

Some “Quats”: Quaternary ammonium compounds, or “quats”, are often used in haircare as conditioning or anti-static agents, or as preservatives. Some quats are abanned from “Clean at Sephora” products because they are formaldehyde-releasors (which are on the prohibited list). However, I found another quat—stearalkonium chloride—in this K18 “Clean at Sephora” hair conditioner. Although it’s generally considered safe at the levels used in cosmetics, it can cause skin/eye irritation in some folks and, perhaps even more importantly, it can contribute to antimicrobial/antibiotic resistance.

Lake colors: Derived from petroleum, there is some concern with lake dyes because of potential heavy metal contamination (although they are regulated by the FDA to keep potential contamination under control).

(Non-nano) titanium dioxide: “Clean at Sephora” does limit nanoparticles (including titanium dioxide), but they do not ban non-nano titanium dioxide. Personally, I am not super concerned about non-nano titanium dioxide in products that are not inhalable, but I do want to skip the powders and sprays that contain titanium dioxide. I did not find any “Clean at Sephora” inhalable products that contain titanium dioxide, so this may not be an issue. It’s just something to watch out for. Here’s a deep dive into titanium dioxide.

Microplastics: Microplastics in cosmetics is a gray area because there is a lot of debate and disagreement about whether or not certain ingredients actually qualify as ‘plastic’. Some of these ingredients have (so far) been shown to be safe when applied to the skin, but the potential concern is what they degrade into once they’re out in the environment. Dimethicone is an example of an ingredient that is currently being evaluated as a potential microplastic, and this one is not banned or restricted in “Clean at Sephora” products.

Other random ingredients: Some ingredients don’t really fit into a category but are potentially concerning. For example, I found myrcene in this Soleil Toujours SPF lotion, which has the Clean + Planet Aware label. But myrcene is a probable carcinogen (Group 2B by the IARC).

The “Clean at Sephora” label also does not mean that all of the ingredients are natural and/or vegan.

The “Planet Aware” Collection

The “Planet Aware” Collection has it’s own set of standards. There is a sort of flexible, tiered system to these standards, which means brands don’t have to meet ALL of them.

On the top tier, brands DO have to meet ALL of these standards in order to quality for the Planet Aware label:

No intentionally-added microplastic beads or other ‘banned’ ingredients like chemical UV filters.
- (As I noted before, the term ‘microplastic’ as it’s used for personal care products is debated. Sephora doesn’t seem to have a strict definition for what they qualify as microplastic.)
Any/all palm oil used has to be certified by the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) and at least 30% of palm oil derivatives and palm kernel oil have to be RSPO certified.
Any/all mica used has to be sourced from vetted suppliers that avoid child and forced labor.
Finished products cannot be tested on animals in any part of the world.
Any plant- or animal-based ingredients are not sourced from protected species governed by Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).

Then there is a second ‘tier’ of criteria and brands must meet 1-2 of these characteristics in order to qualify for the Planet Aware label. (How many they are required to meet depends on the size of the brand and whether or not the products are rinse-off.)

This second tier includes things like:

Have conducted an assessment to identify environmental impacts using recognized methodologies (such as LCA ISO 14040) for 40% of ingredient portfolio by mass (excluding water).
Apply at least 6 out of 12 green chemistry principles in formulation.
Have a policy for 100% of natural ingredients to be deforestation-free.

Then they have a two-tiered category for packaging reduction, another for corporate practices, and another for consumer info and labeling. I’m not going to list all of the criteria here, but each category follows the same format: they have a list of “must-haves” and then they have a secondary list where brands must meet 1-4 characteristics. (You can find the full criteria on this page, under FAQs, click “Find our criteria and learn more here.)

I think these are all good things for making progress, but again: they’re far from perfect. Just like the word “non-toxic”, the term “sustainable” is practically meaningless because there is no standard definition.

A lot of these “Planet Aware” products still come in plastic bottles or use ingredients that may accumulate in the environment.

Additionally, some of the criteria lack specifics. For example, they require that “trace origins of mica used in formulas and source only through fully vetted suppliers, avoiding child and forced labor”. But they don’t specify how they vet and verify. Is it an honor system? Do they do audits? Do they use any other third-party systems?

Similarly, one of the other qualifications is to “have at least select key ingredients that are of certified sustainable origin.” But what do they mean by that? What certifications are we talking about? How do they actually define “sustainable origin”?

Making something that is truly, 100% “sustainable” is extremely difficult, so I don’t want to take away from the steps these brands are taking in the right direction. I just hope that Sephora and all of the brands they carry continue to make planet-friendly improvements in their formulations, packaging, and manufacturing.

My Personal Take

When it comes to most third-party standards or labels, my opinion is usually the same: they are helpful, but they are not perfect. (I’ve said this before about EWG, OEKO-TEX, and NSF/ANSI.)

When I looked into the “Clean at Sephora” standards, they were actually more robust than I thought they would be. (My bar was set pretty low, if I’m being honest!) I’m really glad to see that they ban the worst ingredients and have restrictions on a lot of other ones.

At the end of the day, whether or not you choose to blindly trust the “Clean at Sephora” label depends on how strict your standards are. If you are new to low-tox living and you don’t have any specific health concerns (such as eczema or fertility problems), then I think shopping from the “Clean at Sephora” collection is a good, accessible way to decrease your overall exposure to endocrine disruptors, carcinogens, and allergens in your personal care products, without stressing yourself out too much.

But if you have been on this journey for a while, you’ve “cleaned up” a lot of your products, and you have more strict standards, then you probably won’t want to use the “Clean at Sephora” label as a shopping guide.

Personally, I won’t be loading up my shopping cart with “Clean at Sephora” products without actually reading the ingredient labels first.

Most of the products in the “Clean at Sephora” collection are ones that I wouldn’t worry about using here and there, but I wouldn’t buy them over and over again or use multiple of them day after day.

Pros & Cons of the “Clean at Sephora” Label (In a Nutshell!)

Potential PROS:

Free from all of the ‘worst’ ingredients like phthalates, parabens, and PFAS.
A helpful guide for beginners who want to decrease their overall exposure to toxic chemicals.
They seem to be continually making improvements and updates to make the “Clean at Sephora” label more robust.
“Planet Aware” products are cruelty-free (finished products cannot be tested on animals).

Potential CONS:

Not all natural
Not all vegan
Some potentially problematic ingredients are still allowed. (For example, undisclosed ‘fragrance’/’flavor’ and ethoxylated ingredients. However, there are some restrictions on these ingredients.)
You can’t necessarily trust every product from every brand. For example, a brand may have some products that are “clean” and others that are not.
These labels should be seen more as ‘progress’ more than ‘perfection.’