Verified Beauty Data

Dupe report Nº 037 / Clear, weightless chemical sunscreens

Supergoop! Unseen Sunscreen SPF 40 dupes, ranked by formula match

Same four Drug Facts filters, three of four at near-identical percentages, for about a third of the price.

Some links earn us a commission. It never changes the verdict — the methodology is public.

02 / The scoreboard

2 formulas, 4 numbers that matter

Read the actives column first — it is the apples-to-apples comparison. $ per gram of active is what the working ingredients cost you; the base-formula score is supporting evidence, not the verdict.

Product Actives vs original $ / g of active Price Base formula Verdict
Supergoop! Unseen Sunscreen SPF 40 Concentrations disclosed on the FDA Drug Facts panel — not disclosed $38.00 50 mL · retail 100% the reference The original
Partial overlap missing actives — different formula wearing the keywords
e.l.f. SKIN Suntouchable Invisible Sunscreen SPF 35 Concentrations disclosed on the FDA Drug Facts panel — not disclosed $12.89 50 mL · Amazon 82% highest measured The winner Amazon →

same % as original different % ? in formula, % undisclosed not in formula

03 / The original

Why the original is the original

Unseen Sunscreen SPF 40 is Supergoop's clear, weightless gel sunscreen — a four-filter FDA monograph formula (avobenzone, homosalate, octisalate, octocrylene) that doubles as a makeup-gripping primer. Unlike most cosmetic-INCI comparisons on this site, every number here comes straight off the brand's own Drug Facts panel, not a marketing claim.

That matters because it makes this an unusually clean comparison. e.l.f. SKIN's Suntouchable Invisible Sunscreen SPF 35 discloses the same four filters — Avobenzone 3.0%, Octisalate 5.0%, Homosalate 7.0%, Octocrylene 8.0% — against Supergoop's Avobenzone 3%, Homosalate 8%, Octisalate 5%, Octocrylene 4%. Three of four are identical or within a single point; Octocrylene is the outlier, roughly doubled in the cheaper formula.

One honest wrinkle neither brand advertises loudly: Supergoop's own site now describes this exact SPF 40 formula as discontinued, replaced by a reformulated "Unseen Sunscreen SPF 50." The SPF 40 version compared here is still sold through Amazon and a handful of specialty retailers, but it is no longer Supergoop's current flagship. And regardless of formula, SPF is a tested whole-product outcome, not a sum of filter percentages — so the 40-vs-35 label gap is real and shouldn't be waved away just because the filter package is nearly identical.

04 / The candidates

Every candidate, examined

01 / e.l.f. SKIN

The winner
e.l.f. SKIN Suntouchable Invisible Sunscreen SPF 35 bottle
per g of active
$12.89 retail · 50 mL
82% base formula · highest of 6

e.l.f. SKIN Suntouchable Invisible Sunscreen SPF 35

Shared formula DNA 7 of 26 original ingredients present
Avobenzone Homosalate Octisalate Octocrylene Isododecane Dimethicone Crosspolymer Dimethicone Polymethylsilsesquioxane Isohexadecane Dicaprylyl Carbonate Meadowfoam Estolide Caprylic Polyester-7 Neopentyl Glycol Diheptanoate Lithothamnion Calcareum Extract Caprylyl Glycol Butyrospermum Parkii (Shea) Butter Jojoba Esters Mannitol Boswellia Serrata Resin Extract Lecithin Microcrystalline Cellulose Diatomaceous Earth Zinc Sulfate Silica Tocopherol

shared with original not shared rare marker — weighs more in the score

What matches
Discloses the same four Drug Facts filters — Avobenzone 3%, Homosalate 7%, Octisalate 5%, Octocrylene 8% — three of four identical or within a point of Supergoop's own panel, in the same clear-gel, makeup-gripping-primer format.
What differs
Octocrylene runs roughly double Supergoop's concentration, and the product is labeled SPF 35 versus Supergoop's SPF 40 — SPF is a tested whole-formula outcome, not a sum of filter percentages, so that gap is real. Supergoop's own site now calls this exact SPF 40 formula discontinued, replaced by a reformulated SPF 50 version.
Who it's for
The winner if the near-identical filter package is what you're after — $12.89 versus $38, about a third of the price, though it isn't a labeled SPF match.
Ships in
Packaging not verified No brand or retailer statement on the bottle — we won’t guess.
pH
pH not published L-ascorbic acid needs pH below 3.5 to absorb
Data source
Concentrations disclosed on the FDA Drug Facts panel Avobenzone 3.0%, Octisalate 5.0%, Octocrylene 8.0%, Homosalate 7.0% confirmed via INCIDecoder's transcription of the product's own Drug Facts panel (fetched 2026-07-30). Size 1.7 fl oz / 50 mL confirmed via Target and e.l.f.'s own product page. Amazon price $12.89 PA-API-verified 2026-07-30 (ASIN B0C7SFTTV3). Rating/review count is DermApproved's aggregate across tracked retailers, not a single-source Amazon figure.

$12.89 for 50 mL → — not disclosed: the brand doesn't state active percentages, so this number cannot honestly exist.

Buy on Amazon $12.89

05 / Methodology

How we verified this

Verified 2026-07-30

Every formula on this page was tokenized — split into its individual INCI ingredients — and matched against the EU CosIng ingredient database, so "Aqua," "Water," and "Eau" all resolve to the same ingredient.

The base-formula match score works like this: sharing a rare ingredient counts far more than sharing a common one. Almost every serum contains water and glycerin — that proves nothing. Almost nothing contains Ethoxydiglycol or Laureth-23, so when a candidate shares those with the original, it says something real about how the formula was built. (For the statisticians: it is an IDF-weighted Jaccard similarity over the normalized ingredient lists.)

Scores are computed, not opinions. The verdict tags are our editorial read of the actives, the scores, and the prices — and the methodology stays public so you can disagree with us precisely.

Where the ingredient lists come from

  1. Concentrations disclosed on the FDA Drug Facts panel

Sources for this report

  • INCIDecoder product pages (fetched 2026-07-30) — verbatim transcription of each brand's own FDA Drug Facts panel
  • Amazon Creators API (PA-API) — live price verification 2026-07-30 (e.l.f. Suntouchable, ASIN B0C7SFTTV3, $12.89)
  • Supergoop's own site FAQ (supergoop.com/products/unseen-sunscreen-spf-50), which refers to 'the discontinued Unseen Sunscreen SPF 40' when explaining the SPF 50 reformulation — confirmed 2026-07-30
  • Ipsy and DermApproved brand-price listings for Supergoop Unseen Sunscreen SPF 40 ($38.00, 1.7 fl oz / 50 mL)
  • verifiedbeautydata products.json verified records

06 / Questions

Frequently asked

What is the best Supergoop Unseen Sunscreen SPF 40 dupe?
e.l.f. SKIN Suntouchable Invisible Sunscreen SPF 35 ($12.89) discloses the same four Drug Facts filters — Avobenzone, Homosalate, Octisalate, Octocrylene — three at near-identical percentages to Supergoop's own panel, for about a third of the price.
Is e.l.f. Suntouchable SPF 35 as strong as Supergoop SPF 40?
SPF is a tested, whole-formula outcome, not a sum of filter percentages, so a 40-vs-35 label gap is real even with a near-identical filter package. The filter chemistry is close — Octocrylene is roughly doubled in e.l.f.'s formula — but that doesn't mean the two protect at the same level.
Is Supergoop Unseen Sunscreen SPF 40 discontinued?
Supergoop's own site now refers to this exact SPF 40 face formula as discontinued, replaced by a reformulated "Unseen Sunscreen SPF 50." The SPF 40 version this report compares is still sold through Amazon and a handful of specialty retailers, but it's no longer Supergoop's current flagship product.