NailMates review

Hi guys! NailMates recently contacted me to see if I was interested in doing a review, and at first I wasn't sure about that, because their site mentions gel polish and nail treatments. But then I read further and they mention glitter polish as well... now that could be interesting! By now I think most people are familiar with using aluminium foil to remove glitters (downside: having to cut it all and wrapping around your fingers), or with using a peel off basecoat (downside: not a good thing for people that are tempted to pick their nails). Could these NailMates be the thing that beats them? Let's see that further down, I've tested them on 2 manis, and I picked those polishes to test out my camera a bit more while I was at it :)

Here's what I received, 10 pink caps and a whole bunch of sponges - they're called pads but I don't want to get confuzing with cotton pads and these pads, so I'll refer to them as sponges in this post!

Essence Gabriella with China Glaze Techno.

I went with this combo for 2 reasons: to test my camera with this color purple (which doesn't seem to be a problem if I manage to get the right settings, lol), and to test NailMates on a normal base with added glitters, because the removal of glitters with undies can be easier than with a pure glitter polish.

It's a big post, so adding a jump :)


Here are the instructions for these NailMates:

And here's how they look on my fingers, haha! Let's have a look at those steps mentionned:

1) I did not use a nail file to roughen up the surface of my nails, I never do so with the removal of glitters and I think it's enough hassle as it is, I don't want to have to take even more steps to get them off my nails! But I can imagine that's more important when using gel polish though, I think that's a standard step in the removal of gel polish?

2) I dipped only the tips of the sponges in remover (remover with acetone, but not 100% acetone), the remover quickly spreads itself and you don't need much remover at all to get enough on them. If you do get too much remover on them, you can just squeeze it out of the sponge.

3) Preload: check! I think this is handy about these, you can get it all ready in no time and just slide in your fingers.

4) This wasn't needed, they were big enough already, and fit surprisingly well on all fingers. They're obviously wide, but not so high, so they still fit pretty tight.

5) I didn't time it, but left them on for as long as I'd normally leave on alu foil.


The result? Top left was my first try, yikes! Top right was my middlefinger, where I pressed down hard on the sponge when wiping it off. That clearly gave a much better result, perfect!
But here's a problem I had with these, they feel smoother than my usual cotton pads and are less tight on the nail as well as my foil wrapping. So normally I can press down with ease and slide it all off in 1 go, but here I lacked a bit of grip and it kinda swooshed off my nail really fast when I pressed! So bottom left shows the result of that. Bottom right went better again, but this first attempt didn't convince me yet. I clearly need a little more practice in using these!
But I'm wondering though, if you're doing your own nails, how can you press down to clean it all when you're having these caps on all 10 fingers? So even though you could do 10 at once, I'd stick to 1 hand at a time :)

Yes, it's a lot easier to just grab this product, preload them and slide your fingers in than to cut pads and foil and wrap your fingers one by one, but with this try I still had to clean my fingers to get all those pesky little glitters off. I'm not sure, but it feels as if cotton pads also hold on to the glitters a bit more?

Next try, now with a pure glitter polish!

Shimmer Polish Liana.

Back on the camera topic, I much prefer the first pic of this polish, but this one shows the colors nicely too! Now I just need to learn how to use my camera to get those 2 photos in 1, haha. I keep moving around my house, trying various light and even more settings, still a lot to learn but I'm really enjoying it :)

And back to the NailMates again! I left them on a bit longer than I did on the first attempt with them, and I used them right after swatching. I was hoping for a better result, because it was my 2nd attempt, but well... I guess this pic says it all. I think I just missed the grip that pads do give!

So to summarize, I think this product definitely has potential. Can I get these to work great with more practice? Oh, I probably can, and I will try them again as well! But I had high expectations and wanted it to work like a charm straight away, like I had with the other removal options for glitters. It absolutely has some pros though, they were easy to use and I did like the preloading and the little amount of remover needed. And I can see why this would be great for someone that uses gel polish or has clients with gel polish, but I can't test that so I'm basing my opinion on glitter polish only! And apparently you can sterilize both the caps and the sponges, so they do get bonuspoints for being reusable! So ya, I'll have to try them some more and I think it'll turn out fine then, but I don't want to keep testing until something works for me and then write a review, I want to share my first experience with a product when doing a review :)

What do you think of this product, is it anything you'd use? And if you have gel polish or other nail treatments, do you think this would work well for you?

You find more info about the NailMates and you can buy these products on their website.


The product(s) in this post was/were send to me for review. For more information, please have a look at my Disclosure Policy.