Shark’s FacialPro Glow Feels More Like Homework Than Self-Care

I used the device consistently for two months and never fully figured it out. Shark claims a full session should take about 10 minutes. My first try took 25 minutes, mostly spent flipping through the instructions and questioning my competence. I played Tetris with the attachments on my bathroom counter, shuffled through the two serums it comes with, and reread the instructions every time I forgot which part was supposed to go where and when.

I was left with a sticky-looking, slimy-feeling face — and frustration. After using the device, I put a warm, wet towel on my face and applied all of my most hydrating serums and moisturizers from my medicine cabinet, because my face felt taut and parched. Over several weeks of practice, I did get faster, but the payoff remained minimal. Overall, my skin remained unchanged aside from the redness and dryness I’d experience after the treatment, and by week two, I was dreading using it.

I was also underwhelmed by the four suction tips (two “gentle,” two “normal”) meant to cleanse deep into the skin. After choosing the gentle one and dragging it across my face, I was left with red splotches all over. My hope was that it meant the device was really suctioning out every last bit of New York City pollution from my pores, but it rarely lifted more than surface debris.

Influencers promoting the tool depicted checking the “gunk tank” — which is meant to showcase your extracted impurities — as a “wow” moment. It was consistently anticlimactic for me. I was expecting to see real impurities, like dirt and blackheads, but I was only met with a cloudy fog of dead skin cells. Notably, none of the tips reached all the way into the crevices on the sides of my nose, where most of my congestion lives.

I did enjoy the feeling of the DePuffi attachment’s warm and cold settings, but I didn’t actually notice any real depuffing despite the instruction manual claiming it would deliver an “instantly refreshed and awakened look.” When I tried the heat setting along my neck and over my trapezius muscles, it felt genuinely soothing on sore shoulders. The cold mode felt pleasant under my eyes, but my handy little highlighter-size Therabody facial wand, which I’ve owned for about a year and use almost daily, delivers the same benefit with less effort and more precision.

To make sure I wasn’t just being incompetent, I went to Kristyn Smith, who has been an aesthetician since 2003 and is known for her meticulous, hands-on extraction work and signature lymphatic drainage facials at her New York practice. She put the FacialPro Glow through a full session on me in her office, and the process also took closer to 30 minutes. Much of that was spent rereading instructions, which made both of us question whether the treatment was even designed to be intuitive.

Smith was polite but candid. Although the suction tips reminded her of professional devices, she noted that the tips used in true hydrofacials use bladed edges that create controlled friction to lift debris beneath the surface. The Shark tips, she said, “seem to create just the tiniest bit of friction,” but not enough to deeply clean pores or offer thorough exfoliation. “The gunk tank looks like it’s mostly catching what was already sitting on the surface.”

The FacialPro Glow’s exfoliation power felt weak compared with Dr. Dennis Gross Alpha Beta Universal Daily Peel Pads, Kitsch dermaplaners, or any of the facial scrubs I’ve used in the shower to steam out my pores. Smith recommends sticking with exfoliating products, such as pore strips or chemical exfoliants (like the Wirecutter-recommended Paula’s Choice Skin Perfecting 2% BHA Liquid Exfoliant).

Our panelists loved this exfoliant’s zesty tingle and fragrance-free formula, which has just eight ingredients.

Between low suction, the lack of real mechanical exfoliation, and the superficial gunk tank results, I don’t believe the FacialPro Glow offered any meaningful exfoliation power. And sure, the DePuffi attachment’s warm and cold settings feel pleasant and soothing, but they didn’t appear to make my face look any different. And other devices do that better.

Part of why I love at-home facial tools is because they make self-care feel more restorative. I seek out tools that simplify my routine, feel good to use, and give me immediate relief or satisfaction. But the FacialPro Glow took the joy out of the ritual with too many parts, too much stimulation, and too little reward. Self-care shouldn’t require a learning curve, in my opinion. Facial tools are never necessary, they’re all just for fun. So for now, I’ll be saving my counter space and patience for the ones that actually make my routine feel like a retreat.

This article was edited by Hannah Rimm and Catherine Kast.