All of Your Lipstick and Lip Balm Questions, Answered

Ever wondered what you’re doing wrong when your lipstick cracks after a couple of hours? Is it possible your lips are too dry for lipstick?

Or—after what feels like hundreds of applications—have you questioned whether lip balm *really* helps dry lips?

Well, we cover all these questions and more in this ultimate lippie guide.

It’s your all-inclusive cheat sheet to everything there is to know about lipstick and lip balm.

Plus, we’ll be doling out all our top recommendations on good lipsticks for dry lips as well as the best lip balms for dry lips.

How to Apply Lipstick

• Start with clean, smooth lips (try a lip scrub).

• Apply a hydrating lip balm and blot away the excess with a tissue.

• Starting at the centre of your upper lip, use your lipstick to trace a line outwards along the edge to one corner. Repeat on the other side.

• Trace your lower lip in the same way.

• To fill in, blend colour towards the centre of your mouth with a brush or your finger. In a hurry? Simply rub your lips together.

Why Does My Lipstick Get Crusty?

If you find your lipstick starts to crack or flake during the day, dry lips could be the culprit.

Try upping the ante on your lip hydration and exfoliation routine.

If these efforts don't fix the issue, consider switching to a more moisturising lipstick with ingredients like shea butter.

For recs on the best lipstick for dry lips, keep reading to find our suggestions below.

How to Seal Lipstick on Lips

The secret to lip colour longevity mostly lies in the application (follow the above steps).

But there are a few other things you can do if you prefer even more endurance.

Follow one or all tips as you like...

• Apply a lip primer before lipstick.

• Line your lips with lip liner.

• Set your lipstick with translucent powder.

Amelia shares her tips on how to make red lipstick last longer in the YouTube video below...

2. DOESN'T BLEED

On the note of lipstick's staying where they are supposed to be, they should be able to stay on your lips without bleeding. By which I mean to say, creeping its way beyond the lines of your lips. This tends to become more of a problem with age (as lip creases around the lip become amazing lip-bleeding agents). There are ways you can help prevent this effect but if you pick up one that does this on its own, your makeup routine will be 10x as easy.  

3. OPAQUE

A fancy word in the beauty world that means the product has good colour payoff. A good lipstick should go on as a highly pigmented shade in one to two swipes. Most of all, it should be an even wash of colour so it doesn't appear as a streaky mess over your lips (this tends to happen with many bright coloured lipsticks). A streaky lipstick requires more layers to get an even colour often leaving you with a heavy, sticky application. And if the product isn't opaque enough, you'll also end up having to apply many layers to build up colour, this can mean wasting a lot of product. 

4. CREAMY

Next of course is the creamy factor. Lipstick is made up of oils, pigments and waxes. A good lipstick has a balanced trio that makes the product easy to glide on the lips. A good lipstick should be effortless when applying.