Your Guide To Foundation Finishes & Find Your Favourite

From dewy-looking makeup to natural matte foundation, discover Charlotte's guide to foundation finishes and find your favourite.

The magical world of foundation brings different ingredients, formulas and levels of coverage to explore, and today we’re talking finishes! From glowing, dewy-looking finish makeup to demi and natural matte finishes, there’s a foundation for everyone from Charlotte’s magical makeup collection. Discover them below for flawless-looking face makeup for every occasion!

Dewy Finish Foundation

Foundation with a dewy finish is perfect for those that are ALL about the glow. Wear it for a radiant summer makeup look, a beautiful wedding makeup look or for a natural-looking everyday look!

For makeup which leaves your skin looking dewy, discover Charlotte’s Light Wonder foundation. The light coverage formula gives your skin a glowy, dewy-looking finish that’s gorgeously radiant and perfect for an everyday base. While Light Wonder gives a sheer coverage, it’s a super buildable formula for days or occasions where you’d like a little extra, all whilst feeling comfortable and lightweight on your skin.

Light Wonder Foundation model shot

Natural Matte Finish Foundation

A natural matte finish foundation gives a seamless, matte look that still appears natural on the skin. Perfect for every day or a red-carpet-ready makeup look, wear a natural matte foundation to cover imperfections and blemishes; the full coverage foundation formula will leave you with a gorgeous, flawless-looking complexion!

Choose Charlotte’s Airbrush Flawless Foundation for a natural matte finish that still looks and feels fresh on the skin. Airbrush Flawless Foundation is where makeup magic meets skincare science; the full coverage, natural matte formula contains Charlotte’s magic matrix of ingredients including REPLEXIUM® to reduce the appearance of wrinkles by up to 22%* , and MossCellTec™ No. 1 for boosted skin hydration levels by 216%*!

Top tip: Amp up your flawless and use this natural matte foundation with Charlotte’s Magic Vanish colour correctors and Airbrush Flawless Finish setting powder to magically conceal the appearance of redness, acne, hyperpigmentation and more!

Natural Matte Foundation model image with airbrush flawless foundation

Natural-Looking Finish Foundation

A natural-looking finish foundation sits in-between dewy, glowy foundation and natural matte. If you’d like a satin, demi-mate, skin-like finish that provides natural-looking coverage and a hint of glow, choose a demi-matte foundation.

Charlotte’s Beautiful Skin Foundation is the perfect foundation for a flawless-looking complexion with a demi-matte finish and natural, healthy looking glow! With a buildable, medium coverage and long-lasting formula, you’ll LOVE Charlotte's Beautiful Skin Foundation for every occasion. It flawlessly conceals the look of blemishes and an uneven complexion, while still allowing your skin’s gorgeous natural radiance shine through in the satin, natural looking finish!

Top tip: apply with Charlotte’s Magic Complexion Brush, starting from the centre of the face and blending outwards for a beautiful look!

Beautiful Skin Foundation 11 Warm model shot

Charlotte Tilbury Foundation FAQs

What is the most popular Charlotte Tilbury foundation?

All of Charlotte’s foundations are expertly formulated with kind-to-skin ingredients, combining the powers of colour and science to create your dream complexion. Charlotte has created gorgeous light, medium and full-coverage foundation options, so that everyone, everywhere can find their favourite!

Charlotte's Foundations still life

The most recent formula to join Charlotte’s complexion collection, Charlotte’s Beautiful Skin Foundation, has become popular with celebrities and stars, being worn on red carpets and runways around the world. The medium-buildable formula is perfect for giving skin a healthy-looking glow while drenching it with the goodness of skincare powerhouses like hydrating hyaluronic acid and brightening-effect golden vitamin C, delivering instant complexion perfection while helping to improve the look of skin with every wear.

Airbrush Flawless Foundation is astoundingly popular with makeup lovers that adore a full-coverage makeup look. The formula smooths effortlessly onto the face, delivering full, flawless-looking coverage that feels weightless while hydrating the skin and providing long-term, skincare benefits that reduce the look of wrinkles. Charlotte’s full-coverage foundation is beloved for its instant beautification, helping to create an even-looking canvas that looks airbrushed and flawless!

For glow lovers, Hollywood Flawless Filter is a must-have makeup step! This iconic glow booster is a social media sensation, helping everyone, everywhere to get their Hollywood glow on! Enriched with moisturising, radiance-boosting ingredients that unlock the gorgeous, red-carpet glow of your dreams, this light-coverage formula smooths onto the skin to give your complexion the most flattering, luminous finish that mirrors the effects of social media filters and Hollywood lights!

In Charlotte’s foundation wardrobe, there’s a formula with the finish and coverage you love in your perfect shade!

What is the Difference between Charlotte Tilbury Magic and Flawless Foundation?

Charlotte’s Magic Foundation and Airbrush Flawless Foundation are both beautiful foundation options, but they have some key differences that should help you decide on the perfect finish for your skin type.

Airbrush Flawless Foundation still life

The world fell in love with Charlotte’s original Magic Foundation, with beauty lovers everywhere becoming obsessed with its medium-buildable coverage and flattering, demi-matte finish. Magic Foundation is now ONLY available if you’re signed up to Charlotte’s Loyalty Programme in her Magic Members Shop - log in or sign up here to shop, darling!

Then, Charlotte created her Airbrush Flawless Foundation as her first full-coverage foundation option that makes skin look and feel poreless and flawless! It’s expertly designed to feel weightless on the skin while providing instant full coverage with a natural-looking matte finish, giving skin an airbrushed effect that stays all day.

Charlotte’s Magic Foundation is perfect for anyone that prefers a medium-buildable foundation formula that they can slowly build up to perfect the look of their complexion, whereas Airbrush Flawless Foundation is a perfect choice for those that want a full-coverage look that lasts. As for finish, Charlotte’s Magic Foundation is described as a demi-matte finish that sits between matte and dewy, whereas Airbrush Flawless Foundation is a natural-matte finish that’s matte-not-flat and looks like skin. Whichever you choose, your complexion will look gorgeous!

Is Charlotte Tilbury Airbrush Flawless Foundation worth it?

Darlings, you need to try the magic that is Airbrush Flawless Foundation for yourself! Charlotte created her full-coverage, natural-matte foundation as an INSTANT AIRBRUSH FIX, giving the face full coverage in a flash to create a perfect canvas for the rest of your makeup.

Fifi Airbrush Flawless Foundation model shot

The formula is a beautiful blend of colour and science, delivering full, flawless-looking coverage that hydrates, smooths and blurs the look of skin, while applying with a weightless feel for a comfortable, long-wearing finish. It’s also expertly formulated with powerful skincare ingredients that provide the skin benefits of a potent serum, with REPLEXIUM™ forming 2% of the foundation to help reduce the appearance of wrinkles by up to 22% in 8 weeks!*

With its high-performance wear, porcelain-like finish and powerful skincare benefits, Airbrush Flawless Foundation has cemented itself as a must-have foundation for beauty lovers around the world!

Is Hollywood Flawless Filter worth it?

Hollywood Flawless Filter is the original glow booster, darlings! Charlotte invented the glow category with this iconic formula, bottling the skin-perfecting properties of social media filters and red-carpet lights to give everyone, everywhere her ultimate Hollywood glow secret!

Hollywood Flawless Filter still life

Formulated as a multi-use illuminator, Hollywood Flawless Filter can be used 3 ways: it’s a gorgeous glow primer to apply before foundation, it can be mixed with foundation to add luminosity to your favourite formula, or it can be used as a radiant liquid highlighter.

Giving the skin a Hollywood glow like no other, Hollywood Flawless Filter is a radiance-boosting blend of smoothing airbrush polymers, finely milled powders, glossy oil and brightening porcelain flower extract. It moisturises while smoothing and blurring the look of skin, generating a flawless-looking, red carpet-worthy glow that’s known and loved in Hollywood and around the world! Darlings, Hollywood Flawless Filter is an essential step in any glow lover’s makeup routine! Want to try Charlotte’s globally loved glow booster? Select your free sample card at checkout and you’ll immediately become obsessed!

What foundation goes best with Charlotte Tilbury Flawless Filter?

Hollywood Flawless Filter wears beautifully with all of Charlotte’s foundations! Whether it’s applied before foundation as a luminous primer, after foundation as a glowing liquid highlighter, or even mixed with your favourite foundation, Charlotte’s iconic glow booster is universally loved!

Sofia Tilbury Hollywood Flawless Filter model shot

Charlotte recommends pairing Hollywood Flawless Filter with Airbrush Flawless Foundation, her airbrush-effect foundation for flawless, poreless-looking skin. She loves to pair the full-coverage, long-wearing properties of her Airbrush Flawless Foundation with the gorgeous luminosity of Hollywood Flawless Filter to give the natural-matte formula her signature Tilbury glow! This skin-perfecting combination is the secret to airbrushed, flawless-looking skin with a head-turning Hollywood glow!

Charlotte’s Best Foundation for Large Pores

If you experience larger-looking pores and are trying to reduce their appearance with the foundation you wear, Charlotte recommends using a full-coverage formula like Airbrush Flawless Foundation. Larger pores can have a harder time gelling with glowy complexion products; Charlotte recommends using a matte formula with smoothing, pore-blurring effects that help pores to appear less prominent. Also, having larger pores can make you prone to excess oil production, so using a long-wearing, stay-all-day formula is the best choice for long-lasting coverage.

Flawless Poreless Skin Secrets packshot for blog

Airbrush Flawless Foundation is resistant to humidity and sweat, applying evenly to reduce the appearance of pores and creating an airbrushed-looking canvas that wears beautifully throughout the day. Once you’ve applied this full-coverage foundation, pores look instantly blurred and the complexion looks airbrushed and flawless!

Airbrush Flawless Finish is the perfect partner for your Airbrush Flawless Foundation. Formulated with smoothing, pore-blurring ingredients, Charlotte’s award-winning pressed powder helps to set foundation and concealer in place while perfecting the look of skin. Tap this beautifying powder onto porous areas such as the T-zone, cheeks and around the nose to disguise the appearance of pores and unlock long-lasting, flawless-looking complexion perfection!