A TikToker Swabbed Sephora Makeup Testers For Bacteria & You Probably Won't Want To Use Them

Have you ever tried out blush or swatched a lipstick in-store at Sephora? Well, this recent viral TikTok video will probably make you think twice about touching makeup testers at the store ever again.

TikTok user @howdirtyis, whose online profile is filled with videos finding out how dirty common surfaces and items are, conducted an experiment by swabbing sample items like lipstick, blush, eyeshadow and mascara at Sephora to see if bacteria were present on the testers and the results are haunting.

"Just how dirty are all those testers in Sephora?" they captioned the video, which was posted in April and has over 3.4 million views.

The video shows the TikToker swabbing lipsticks, multi face sticks, compacts of blush, concealer, mascara, and an eyeshadow palette.

They then swabbed the collected samples in labelled petri dishes, which were left aside to allow the bacteria to grow.

After some time, the TikToker collected the petri dishes, which now appear to be full of bacteria.

They first show the petri dish containing the swab from the multi-stick.

"'Multi stick lookin' nasty af," text over the clip reads. The petri dish appears almost fully covered in bacteria growth.

Next, they looked at the blush.

"Blush is flush with growth," they said of the dish, which was also almost completely covered with bacteria.

The eyeshadow palette didn't fare much better, with the petri dish also covered with bacteria. "Whole variety of stuff on this one," the TikToker said.

The concealer, however, had what appeared to be no bacterial growth, as did the lipstick and mascara the TikToker swabbed.

The results may be a bit upsetting to those who have ever tried a tester in Sephora without first cleaning it.

The video has amassed more than 389,000 likes and thousands of comments, with many people expressing their shock at the results.

Some people were surprised that some of the testers came back clean.

"Not gonna lie, the concealer and mascara was a shock," said one person.

"As someone who used to work at Sephora, we did clean and replace lipsticks, eyeliner and mascara more frequently than powder products," another person wrote.

Narcity has reached out to Sephora for comment but did not hear back in time for publication.

It's worth noting that while the results definitely might look gross, the TikToker didn't actually indicate what kind of bacteria was on the testers.

However, in 2018, CBC Marketplace found that makeup testers at multiple beauty stores in the Greater Toronto Area tested for Staphylococcus aureus bacteria and mold.

Marketplace producers went undercover at makeup stores like Shoppers Drug Mart, Sephora, The Body Shop and MAC Cosmetics and swabbed 60 mascaras, lip glosses, cream blushes, lipstick and eyeshadow testers and then sent them to a microbiology lab.

According to CBC, the lab found that 40% of the samples had Staphylococcus aureus bacteria, and 28% were growing mold.

Staphylococcus bacteria can cause infections, including boils on the skin and food poisoning, according to the Mayo Clinic.

In a similar case, a 2017 experiment conducted by Rossen Reports and NBC News' TODAY found that makeup testers from popular beauty stores in the U.S. came back with harmful bacteria, including E. coli and Klebsiella pneumoniae, two types of bacteria normally found in human intestines.

If you're a regular Sephora shopper, the info might make you think twice before swatching that tester next time.