Review: Belif Bergamot Herbal Extract Toner

Toners have gotten a bad rap. I (along with many people I know) grew up with really harsh, astringent toners with a high alcohol content. These toners were meant to aggressively dry out acne to try to get rid of it. Today, we know that this isn’t a good way to deal with acne, and have learned to stay away from high-alcohol toners.

But toners are fantastic skincare step, provided you use one with good ingredients. Toners start the process of replenishing moisture that can be lost in the cleansing and preps the skin to better-absorb later steps.

I tried this toner as a part of the Belif Bestsellers On-The-Go kit from Sephora, and I have to say, I enjoyed it a lot.

The Belif Bergamot Herbal Extract Toner is meant to “to balance normal to combination skin, leaving it hydrated, soothed, and balanced after cleansing”. It has a lot of great ingredients to control oil production while soothing skin. Bergamot, the first ingredient after water, is a natural antiseptic that can reduce eczema and the itching effects that go along with it. It also naturally controls oil production and balances skin.

Like many other Belif products, it contains many more extracts besides the main bergamot extract. It contains sage, oat, marigold, raspberry leaf, and indigo root extracts (among many others), which all soothe the skin and reduce inflammation.

This toner does contain alcohol as the fourth ingredient so if you have sensitivities to alcohol, be warned. BUT WAIT, you may ask, what was all of that at the top about not using toners with a lot of alcohol in them? What I said at the top of this post is still true; you shouldn’t be using a toner with high amount of alcohol in it. However, because of the high amount of skin-soothing ingredients in this toner (especially the fact that bergamot extract is so high), it seems to balance out the use of alcohol in this formulation. The presence of alcohol in this toner allows for the toner to spread and dry quickly, and helps the beneficial ingredients absorb more efficiently. To me, this makes it a worthwhile product, but again, if you are sensitive to alcohol, this may be one to avoid.

The toner has a pleasant, fresh scent that almost smells lemony. It’s a little on the strong side at first, but it dissipates quickly. A little goes a long way with this toner too, which is always nice to see. I use enough to moisten half of a cotton round, and that is enough to cover my whole face and neck.

True to its purpose, I didn’t notice any one specific benefit to this toner, but rather an overall healthier, more luminous complexion. It really felt like this toner was enabling my other skincare steps to work better – my essence was more smoothing and my moisturizer was more hydrating when I was using this toner.

I definitely miss this now that I’ve used it up, but I’m also not sure if I want to spend the $28 on a full-size bottle yet. It’s a really nice toner, but there are many lower-costing alternatives I want to try out to see if I get a similar effect.

Disclaimers: I purchased this product 100% myself. This post contains no affiliate links.