the sources
Who rates, how, and who pays them.
Scoring cosmetics is messy. Raters use different scales, measure different things, and sometimes flat-out contradict each other. Most apps hide that mess behind one tidy number. We’d rather show you the mess, because the mess is the information.
Every number on a Greenlens product page comes from a named source with a visible funding model, including the three signals we compute ourselves. This page explains each one: what it measures, how the score is built, and where it honestly falls short. The scoring tables below are read from the same data the scorers run on, so they can’t drift from what the code does.
1 Normalize
Each source keeps its native scale; we map it to 0–100, flipping "lower is better" scales so higher is always better.
2 Never blend a disagreement
Same-axis opinions stay side by side. When they split, we show who disagrees and why, not an average that hides it.
3 You weight the overall
The single overall number is a weighted mean across axes using your sliders, computed live and never stored.
Computed by Greenlens
Three signals we derive ourselves from open data. They are ordinary raters in the list: shown with a funding tag, free to disagree with external sources, and never given a privileged “Greenlens says” position.
Greenlens Ingredient Scan
Ingredient safetyIndependentNative scale 0–100, higher is better · normalized to 0–100
Reads a product’s INCI ingredient list and checks each ingredient against open EU regulatory data: Annex II (prohibited in cosmetics), Annex III (restricted, including the labelled fragrance allergens), Annex V (preservatives with limits), plus a small set of common transparency concerns that are not regulatory bans.
The score starts at 100 and subtracts a penalty per matched ingredient, de-duplicated so a repeated ingredient counts once:
- Prohibited (Annex II)
- −55 pts
- Restricted (Annex III)
- −12 pts
- Transparency concern
- −10 pts
- Labelled fragrance allergen
- −6 pts each, capped at −30 total
Limits · An ingredient list says nothing about concentration: a trace of a restricted preservative and a heavy dose score the same. List quality varies by contributor, and a product with no ingredient data gets no score at all rather than a guessed one.
Greenlens Packaging Scan
PackagingIndependentNative scale 0–100, higher is better · normalized to 0–100
Reads the packaging-material tags recorded for a product on Open Beauty Facts and scores the recyclability of the materials, using open standards: SPI/ASTM resin codes, How2Recycle and APR curbside-acceptance guidance, and the EU packaging directive. Each recognized material lands in a tier; whole-component problems (a pump mixing plastic with a metal spring) override their resin.
- Widely recyclable
- ≈ 88 / 100
- Limited recyclability
- ≈ 52 / 100
- Rarely recycled
- ≈ 28 / 100
- Hard to recycle
- ≈ 14 / 100
Limits · This rates materials, not the carbon footprint or refill story. A tag we don’t recognize (a shape like “bottle”) is skipped, never treated as unrecyclable. Curbside acceptance also varies by municipality, so a tier is a typical case, not a promise.
Cruelty-Free Certification
LaborNonprofitNative scale 0–100, higher is better · normalized to 0–100
A brand-level signal relayed from the published cruelty-free certification lists, Leaping Bunny (Cruelty Free International) and PETA’s Beauty Without Bunnies, which is why one entry rates every product of a brand. Statuses map to fixed scores:
- Certified cruelty-free and fully vegan
- 92
- Certified cruelty-free
- 85
- Brand certified, parent company conduct contested
- 55
- Sells where animal testing can be required
- 30
The contested middle is deliberate: a certified brand owned by a conglomerate that sells in markets requiring animal testing (Garnier, Dove, NYX) is exactly the case advocates disagree about, so it sits between the poles instead of being rounded to either.
Limits · Absence from the lists means no certification on record. That reads as unknown, never as “tests on animals”. Statuses genuinely change with ownership and market entry; this snapshot is dated 2026-07 and is meant to be refreshed from the published lists.
External raters
Independent opinions we surface alongside our own. Sources marked illustrative are not integrated. Their numbers in the demo catalog are invented stand-ins (EWG, Yuka and INCI Beauty are licensing-blocked; Greenlens never scrapes them) and are stamped the same way wherever they appear.
EWG Skin Deep
Ingredient safetyNonprofitillustrativeNative scale 1–10, lower is better · normalized to 0–100
The Environmental Working Group’s Skin Deep database rates cosmetic ingredients by hazard, 1 (low concern) to 10. Nonprofit, funded by donations. Licensing-blocked for us, so it appears as an invented stand-in that lets the demo exercise disagreement.
Yuka
Ingredient safetySubscriptionillustrativeNative scale 0–100, higher is better · normalized to 0–100
A consumer app scoring food and cosmetics 0–100 from ingredient analyses. Funded by subscriptions to its premium tier, with no brand sponsorship. Licensing-blocked for us, so the numbers here are invented stand-ins.
INCI Beauty
Ingredient safetyAd-supportedillustrativeNative scale 0–20, higher is better · normalized to 0–100
A French ingredient analyzer scoring products 0–20 from its own ingredient ratings. Ad-supported, which is exactly the kind of fact the funding tag exists to keep visible. Licensing-blocked, so the numbers are invented stand-ins.
Open Beauty Facts
EnvironmentalNonprofitNative scale 0–100, higher is better · normalized to 0–100
The open, crowd-sourced product database Greenlens ingests its catalog from. When a contributor-computed Eco-Score is present we surface it on the environmental axis; it is real ingested data, present for only a small slice of cosmetics.
Good On You
LaborIndependentillustrativeNative scale 1–5, higher is better · normalized to 0–100
Rates fashion and beauty brands on people, planet and animals, 1–5. Editorially independent. No integration yet; it stands in so the labor axis can show a second, holistic voice next to the certification signal.
How2Recycle
PackagingNonprofitillustrativeNative scale 0–100, higher is better · normalized to 0–100
The North American packaging labeling program behind the how2recycle label. Nonprofit. No integration yet; it stands in so the packaging axis can demonstrate a label rater disagreeing with our material scan.
What we refuse to do
- Average away a disagreement. Conflicting opinions on the same axis are never blended into one number; the spread stays visible with each rater named.
- Store an overall score. The blended number exists only at read time, under your weights. There is no hidden “objective” default to inherit.
- Hide who pays. Funding model travels with every rating, including our own computed signals, which are labelled like any other rater.
See it applied on any product page under “How this score is built”, or browse where the raters disagree.