Terms of use

This is not medical advice

Pore Evidence is an evidence lookup, not a clinical service. It is written and maintained by a software engineer, not a dermatologist, physician or cosmetic chemist. Nothing here diagnoses a skin condition, recommends or discourages a treatment, or establishes a clinical relationship of any kind.

Acne has causes that have nothing to do with cosmetic ingredients — hormonal, genetic, bacterial, medication-related and more. If your acne is persistent, painful, scarring or worsening, see a qualified healthcare professional. Do not start, stop or change a prescribed treatment because of something you read on this site.

What a result is

A result describes what a defined set of cited sources says about an ingredient name. It is a report on a body of literature, not a measurement of your product and not a prediction about your skin.

Ingredient-level evidence does not transfer cleanly to a finished formulation. Concentration, the vehicle carrying the ingredient, interactions with the rest of the formula, how the product is used and individual skin response all matter, and none of them are visible to a name lookup. Much of the historical evidence in this field comes from animal assays that do not reliably predict human outcomes, which is the whole reason this site reports tiers and sources instead of a single number. The methodology page explains how each result class is assigned and where the corpus is thin.

A finding of “no concern found” is not a finding of safety. It usually means the corpus contains no assessment either way. Treat an absence of evidence as an absence of evidence.

Accuracy and availability

The site is provided as it is, without warranty of any kind, including any implied warranty of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. Sources are cited so you can check them; they may be superseded, and a citation here is not an endorsement of the cited work or a guarantee that it remains current.

Text recognition from a photograph is imperfect, especially on curved, small or low-contrast labels. Review what was recognised before trusting a result based on it. Pages may change, move or be withdrawn without notice, and availability is not guaranteed.

Acceptable use

You may use the checker for personal and professional research, and you may link to any page here freely. Please do not attempt to disrupt the site, scrape it in a way that degrades it for others, or present its output as a clinical finding, a safety certification or a regulatory determination.

The editorial text, the presentation and the assembled dataset remain the property of Pore Evidence. The underlying scientific literature belongs to its publishers and is cited, not reproduced.

Liability

To the extent permitted by law, Pore Evidence is not liable for any loss arising from use of this site or reliance on a result, including money spent on or wasted products, skin reactions, or a delay in seeking care. Deciding what to put on your skin is your decision, and where it matters it is one to make with a clinician.

Nothing here limits any right you have that cannot be limited by law.

Changes

These terms may be updated as the site changes, and the version published here is the one that applies. What the site does and does not collect is set out on the privacy page.