Who Topped the 2025 Vogue Business Beauty Index?

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Tariffs, price hikes, ingredient sourcing struggles: the 2025 beauty landscape has been turbulent to say the least. Beauty’s financial performance so far this year has been a mixed bag: the most recent earnings season saw companies like Puig thrive thanks to strong sales from its fragrance and skincare categories and a bullish market performance from Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) and the US, while Estée Lauder struggled to gain momentum, thanks to declines in its travel retail business and slowing sales growth in the Estée Lauder and La Mer brands. Pricing also remains a concern for both brands and consumers amid ongoing uncertainty around tariffs — companies such as Elf and Saie have already announced price increases, as Shiseido preempted the need to raise costs in a recent earnings call. Thirty-five per cent of consumers expect to purchase beauty products less frequently if the price of products rises.

But it’s not all doom and gloom. The slight glimmers of hope seen in the 2024 M&A landscape — which we captured in last year’s Beauty Index — ramped up in the first half of 2025 with several exciting acquisitions. This year, L’Oréal announced it was taking a majority stake in Medik8, a minority stake in Jacquemus Beauty, as well as acquiring Color Wow, pending regulatory approval. Elf Beauty announced its $1 billion acquisition of Rhode, Hailey Bieber’s beauty and skincare brand, marking one of the most high-profile beauty deals in recent years. Unilever acquired Dr Squatch and Wild, and Church and Dwight snapped up buzzy, hand sanitiser brand Touchland. Huda Kattan reclaimed full ownership of Huda Beauty, buying back a minority stake from private equity firm TSG Consumer Partners in June 2025, while General Atlantic acquired Mona Kattan’s fragrance brand, Kayali. Rare Beauty has reportedly considered — and since paused — its sale within the past year.

These industry shifts have had a seismic effect on the 2025 Vogue Business Beauty Index ranking. The Ordinary, which has held the top spot since the first annual Beauty Index in 2023, has been toppled off the leaderboard to second place by British brand Charlotte Tilbury, which rose from fourth position last year. Fenty Beauty and Nars have both made it into the top five this year, thanks to improvements in their digital marketing and communication around sustainability efforts. La Roche-Posay was the only dermatologist-led skincare brand in this year’s top five, with strong consumer sentiment scores.

How did they get there? Our annual ranking of the top 30 beauty brands, encompassing both emerging and established players, analyses everything from marketing moves and purchase intent to technological advancements and sustainability efforts. Read the full top five breakdown below.

Top five beauty brands

Puig

Rank change: +3

• Charlotte Tilbury tops the Beauty Index for the first time, knocking The Ordinary off the number one position for the first time since the Beauty Index launched in 2023.
• The brand’s “Legendary for a Reason” campaign, which poked fun at dupe culture, was key to its rise within the digital marketing pillar, along with its social strategy.
• Charlotte Tilbury’s 2025 collaboration with Genshin Impact saw the brand produce co-branded beauty products and collectibles with the gaming franchise.

The Estée Lauder Companies

Rank change: -1

• For the first time since 2023, The Ordinary no longer holds the number one position within the Beauty Index.
• The brand remains the leader in consumer sentiment, boosted by perception of efficacy and quality. The Ordinary is also the number one brand consumers expect to purchase from, with an average likelihood of 7.6 out of 10.
• The brand’s communication around sustainability and purpose-led marketing wins it the top spot within the ESG pillar.

LVMH

Rank change: +3

• Fenty Beauty climbed three positions to third place in this year’s Beauty Index, re-entering the top five at its highest position yet, after being in fifth place in 2023.
• Consumers appreciate Fenty Beauty for standing for values that they support. They view it as the top brand for championing diversity and gender identity through its marketing campaigns, with this ethos also reflected in its product offerings.
• Fenty Beauty’s focus on the Chinese market, following its Sephora launch in 2024, is boosting its digital marketing score. The brand has seen a rise in engagement across all Chinese social platforms tracked.

L’Oréal Group

Rank change: -2

• La Roche-Posay remains the only dermatologist-led skincare brand within the top five. Despite showing resilience, particularly within the consumer sentiment pillar, the brand declined two positions.
• One of the most ubiquitous brands in the Beauty Index, with the third-largest awareness, La Roche-Posay falls short in its perceived quality and brand association.
• The brand’s digital marketing performance is down. Briefly bolstered by the popularity of dermatologist-led content in 2024, this impact started to wane in 2025.

Shiseido

Rank change: +2

• Nars makes its way back into the top five, climbing two positions from seventh place in 2024. In the inaugural Beauty Index in 2023, the brand held fourth position.
• The brand holds the top spot in the innovation pillar, with ongoing developments in AI-based shade selection, virtual stores and immersive gaming experiences this year.
• While it has a robust score for consumer sentiment, Nars is not a brand consumers feel particularly passionate about. What lets it down is consumer opinion on its brand story and uniqueness.

Battle of the beauty brands

Each of the 30 brands in the Vogue Business Beauty Index is ranked based on its performance across four core business areas: innovation, digital marketing, ESG (environmental, social and governance) and consumer sentiment. Below, we reveal how the top five beauty players scored in each category.

Assessing brands on their impact on consumers, the sentiment pillar examines everything, from perception of quality and brand association to how likely consumers are to purchase from a brand. Read more here.

Digital marketing is an increasingly competitive field. This pillar tracks performance across Western social media (Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and YouTube), as well as Chinese social media platforms (WeChat, Weibo, Xiaohongshu and Douyin). Read more here.

Transparency is a key element of sustainability practices, yet not all brands communicate policies, let alone progress in this area. Tracked against 25 ESG metrics, such as toxic runoff policies and brand use of renewable energy across its supply chain, the analysis also incorporates data on the consumer perception of brand sustainability efforts. The ESG pillar allows us to track progress — or lack of — in this area. Read more here.

Our innovation pillar dives into everything from brand development in skin diagnostics and colour matching to interactive stores and gaming activations. This year’s results show brands have had to become more selective with their budgets. Read more here.

How we do it

Brand performance for the Vogue Business Beauty Index is evaluated against over 120 data points across consumer sentiment, digital marketing, ESG and innovation.

The overall weightings of the assessment categories and their metrics are determined by industry relevance and importance to the consumer, allowing for an objective assessment of a brand’s performance. The final weighting for each category is agreed upon following a review process with our data analysts and expert editors.

Thirty brands are assessed, including both established leaders and emerging beauty disruptors, enabling learnings from global brands and rapidly growing newcomers alike. In this edition, five brands entered the Beauty Index: Sol de Janeiro (11th place), Byoma (27th place), Merit (28th place), Beauty of Joseon (29th place), and Refy (30th place).

Consumer research remains fundamental to the Vogue Business Beauty Index, with readers across several Condé Nast titles — including Vogue, GQ, Vanity Fair and Condé Nast Traveller — participating in an annual consumer luxury consumer sentiment survey that ensures granularity is achieved when it comes to understanding awareness, customer challenges and beliefs about brands.

Future iterations of the Vogue Business Beauty Index will continue to maximise the brands, metrics and digital platforms assessed, with additions prioritised in line with industry needs and developments.

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You can download a free excerpt of the Vogue Business Beauty Index here.

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