Review: Etude House Wonder Pore Freshner 500ml

Never would I imagine the words ‘wonder’ and ‘pore’ together in the same sentence, let alone a name for a beauty product. Say hello to Etude House’s Wonder Pore Freshner, a toner with some lofty promises that are all targeted at your pores. As someone with pore issues, I smiled and thought, “Oh, how wonder pore! A toner that claims to be everything I want it to be.”

The Claims

Are you sitting down? You better be. This is what Etude House claims the Wonder Pore Freshner does:

- Works to maintain the skin’s pH balance
- Refine skin tone
- Improve skin elasticity
- Deep clean pores
- Minimize the appearance of pores
- Control oil
- Provide moisture to the skin

Outrageous, right? That my friends, is just about everything I want out of a toner. Or skincare in general. Does it really do all those things? Read on, my friend.

Packaging

The Wonder Pore Freshner comes in a light blue plastic bottle that’s available in two sizes holding, 250 and 500ml. Foolishly and because I’m native to a country that has not adapted the metric system, I opted for the 500ml size. Totally unaware that 500ml basically means the size Costco would carry if Etude House was a Costco brand. Since you don’t really need a whole lot of toner when you use it, I’ve ended up with what I’m convinced is a lifetime supply of toner.

What’s really cool about the design of the bottle is that there’s no need to turn the bottle upside down to saturate a cotton pad. Just think about how much of a pain it would be to do that with a 500ml bottle! Instead, the bottle has a pump that you push down and up squirts the Wonder Pore Freshner. The idea being, you cover the pump with the cotton pad you’re about to use and then pump, like so:

Word to the wise…make sure that your hand and the cotton is covering the pump completely before you pump down. And don’t hover over it while you’re doing that. Otherwise, it’ll just squirt into your eye or you’ll totally miss and get it on the wall. Once you’re aware of how it works, it’s actually a super cool design. You don’t have to turn it upside down, ever!

Texture

Feels like your standard toner, only without the random sensations associated with toner. I’m guessing this is due to the fact that it has a pH that is similar to the skin’s pH. I like knowing that when I use this toner, I won’t feel any weird tingling or cooling sensations.

Scent

None.

Performance

Using this the last two weeks I’ve noticed that it does a great job picking up any excess dirt that you might’ve missed while washing your face. As for oil control, I’ve noticed that my face doesn’t get as oily immediately after washing. Usually it takes about 2 hours for my face to get oily after washing — with the Wonder Pore Freshner, it’ll take 3 hours for oil to start building up again. A suggested use for the Wonder Pore Freshner is to put it in a spray bottle and spray when you start feeling oily. I’ve yet to try this out, but I’ll provide an update to see if this holds off the oil longer. My concern with the spray bottle is that I’m usually wearing makeup during the day so I’m not sure what it’ll do to my makeup.

As for my pores, I’ve noticed that they don’t get so huge in the middle of the day and that’s related to the fact that I’m not as oily while using the Wonder Pore Freshner. They’re still visible, but that’s unfortunately due to genetics. Skin elasticity is also related to pore size, so given the results thus far, it’s safe to say that my skin is a bit more elastic than before.

Regarding skin tone, I’m not quite sure much of a difference was made there. At the same time, I wasn’t really banking on the Wonder Pore Freshner to be effective with skin tone — very few skincare products are. Overall, I think the strongest points of this toner is that it’s deep cleaning, oil controlling and therefore larger pore appearance minimizing. That effect makes for more elastic skin!

Does it provide more moisture? Unfortunately I can’t say — my skin is never dry.

Overall, 5 true claims out of 7 isn’t bad! Two thumbs up from me, unless you were looking for something to even out your skin tone.

You can pick up the Etude House Wonder Pore Freshner in the 500ml size at KpopHeaven for $28 USD. Seems steep at first but when you consider the fact that you get 500ml in a huge econo-sized bottle, it’s well worth it!

Score: 4/5

Disclaimer: Etude House Wonder Pore Freshner was provided to me for review purposes only. The opinions in this review are 100% my own.