

(update: for the 2022 Hwahae Beauty Awards click here)
Cult Korean beauty app HwaHae announced the winners of the much anticipated 2021 HwaHae Beauty Awards. Forget about sponsorships and paid advertising, the HwaHae Beauty Awards are a celebration of the most trusted beauty products of 2021, as voted by 10 million Korean consumers.
HwaHae is currently the most popular beauty app in Korea, with a record of over 10 million downloads as of 2021 (source). The name HwaHae (‘화해’), comes from an abbreviated form of the Korean phrase ‘화장품을 해석하다’ (‘To analyse cosmetics’). HwaHae was created in 2013 by CEO Lee Woong and two friends with one mission: provide users with accurate information on their favourite cosmetics to help them make more informed choices.
Today users can use the platform to find products that are suitable for their skin type, check their ingredient lists, and read honest and unbiased reviews from other users. HwaHae uses information from the Association of Korean Dermatologists (AKD) to categorise beauty products by ingredients and their suitability for different skin types and displays the hazard level for each ingredient, using the rating system created by the EWG (Environmental Working Group, a US activist group).
The app became an immediate hit and it’s recently been reported that over 80% of Korean women in their 20s and 30s are HwaHae users (source).
On 24 November 2021, HwaHae finally announced the winners of the 2021 HwaHae Beauty Awards. The HwaHae Beauty Awards showcase the best beauty products of the year.
Winners are determined based only on the reviews and ratings left by HwaHae users throughout the year. As a platform built around fairness and transparency, HwaHae followed a meticulous selection process to filter out untrustworthy reviews and spam comments to ensure the authenticity of the data collected. In particular, for the 2021 edition of the awards, HwaHae analysed over 10 million reviews left by users from November 2020 to October 31st 2021.
Considering the platform’s powerful position in the market, beauty industry professionals place great importance on the results of these awards and they’re widely considered to be the most reliable representation of consumer trends in Korea. Similarly to what emerged from the 2021 Olive Young Beauty Awards, over 65% of the award-winning products were cosmetics produced by small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), confirming an increasing consumer preference for new, up-and-coming brands.
(Check out my coverage of the previous editions of the Hwahae Beauty Awards)
Source: Hwahae App, Hwahae Blog
Translation: © 2021 Odile Monod
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