Around the middle of last year, I became aware of a new makeup category (or, at least, one I hadn’t previously heard of): lip oil. Seemingly overnight, brands at every price point had begun offering new ranges of lip oils. I wasn’t particularly tempted by the name, which sounded a little, well, gross. In general, oil is something you want to wipe off your lips, not put on them. I imagined lip oil as a lighter, thinner, practically clear alternative to lip gloss. If I wanted a product with that finish and consistency, I thought, I’d just rub coconut oil on my mouth.

My mistake in all this was taking the beauty industry at its word. I like to portray myself on this blog as a savvy consumer with a bullshit detector perpetually set to eleven, but don’t be fooled: I’m as susceptible to marketing as anyone else with an internet connection. It didn’t even occur to me until I swatched Ilia’s lip oil in Maybe Violet at Sephora last month that lip oil and lip gloss were the same damn thing.

It was a lip gloss! It was a fucking $26 lip gloss! In fact, its official name was “Balmy Gloss Tinted Lip Oil”! How could I have been so naïve?

Paradoxically, this revelation made me more, not less, inclined to try a lip oil. I gravitate toward hydrating lip glosses every winter, when my lips start to crack and peel. If lip oils were especially hydrating lip glosses, then what was I waiting for? So, despite my 2024 resolution to impulse-buy fewer drugstore products, I impulse-bought a NYX lip oil for $8.99 at Target three weekends ago. I’d heard good things about the Fat Oil formula, and I went for a shade I knew I’d wear: That’s Chic, a purplish berry similar in color to probably two dozen lip products I’ve owned since the early 2010s. If we’re being honest, though, it was the neon green cap that sold me. I’m powerless against chartreuse.

“Fat Oil Lip Drip” is an odd name. First, the phrase “fat oil” is redundant, since oil, by definition, is liquid fat. (And I thought the beauty industry was all about slimness these days?) Then there’s “lip drip.” I assume NYX means “drip” in the idiomatic sense of “cool accessory,” but “lip drip” combined with “oil” makes me think of oil dripping off one’s lips after an especially greasy meal. Which, again, is a little gross. And I’m no graphic designer, but the arrangement of the words on the bottle is confusing. I thought the full name of the product was “Fat Lip Drip Oil,” which made even less sense than “Fat Oil Lip Drip,” until I looked it up to be sure.

Typography aside, though, I really like the packaging. The bottle is a satisfying size, shorter and squatter than your average lip gloss, which helps it stand upright with ease. Here it is next to a NYX Butter Gloss:

Inside is a wide doefoot that extracts enough product for one full application (which is lucky, because the design of the tube is similar to that of the Soft Whip Blurring Matte Lip Cream tube, and wiping excess gloss on the rim would make an oily mess):

The lip oil has a pleasant berry scent very similar to that of Glossier’s Berry Balm Dotcom, but fainter. (I owned Berry Balm Dotcom for a while but found the scent overpowering.) The fragrance does linger on my lips for about half an hour, but it’s not strong enough to annoy me, and I’m quite sensitive to scented lip products. I don’t know if the correspondence between That’s Chic’s berry color and berry fragrance is a coincidence, or if the lip oils all have different scents. If I ever buy another shade, I’ll update this post!

That’s Chic is a soft magenta shade with a glassy and translucent, but sparkle-free, finish:

The formula is more pigmented than I was expecting, which was a nice surprise. If you’re looking for a barely-there tint, this isn’t the lip oil for you; it provides less color than the NYX Butter Glosses, but a little more than the Revlon Super Lustrous glosses. (I don’t have any other gloss formulas on hand for comparisons, unfortunately.) From left to right, here’s one swipe each of NYX Butter Gloss in Cranberry Pie, That’s Chic, and Revlon Super Lustrous The Gloss in Fatal Apple:

And a lip swatch with one coat of That’s Chic:

This is a very comfortable lip gloss. It’s thick without stickiness, making my lips feel protected, glazed, as if I’m a ceramic figurine. The glossy look wears off in an hour or two, but the tint and hydration linger for another hour or so. Here I am wearing it with Laura Mercier Caviar Stick in Moonlight, About-Face Cheek Freak Blush Balm in Score, and one of my favorite sweaters. (I’ve been going for lazy monochromatic looks recently; if it’s tacky to match your blush and lip gloss to your sweater, I just don’t want to hear it, sorry.) Excuse my dazed expression, but I hadn’t had my coffee yet.

And here I am wearing the same combo outside, during Philly’s first snowstorm in two years:

I wasn’t expecting longevity from a lip oil, and wasn’t surprised that I had to reapply That’s Chic after a cup of coffee. However, I was surprised to consult NYX’s product description and learn that it promises “up to 12 hours of hydration and protection”! This gloss has no more lasting power than any other non-sticky drugstore lip gloss I’ve tried. Yes, the hydration does last after the shine fades, but twelve hours? I don’t understand why NYX felt the need to make such an obviously false claim.

Overall, though, I’m very pleased with That’s Chic, and I’d buy more shades if there were any that appealed to me in the rather limited eight-shade range. If you want a revolutionary or long-lasting (or revolutionarily long-lasting) product, don’t bother with Fat Oil Lip Drip. But if you want a truly hydrating lip gloss in cute packaging, then go for it. I’ve been wearing That’s Chic constantly since I bought it, and my lips look and feel significantly smoother than they did at the beginning of this month.

I hope NYX eventually expands the Fat Oil shade range, but in classic NYX fashion, they’ve already moved on to other glosses, including the Duck Plump formula, which they’re promoting in Ulta with this nightmarish pair of disembodied lips. I think someone needs to check the designer’s freezer for human heads.

I could write a whole other post bemoaning the normalization of lip filler for increasingly younger women, but why should I bother? That image says it all.