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The Ordinary vs FRE

The Ordinary and FRE are two skincare lines built around distinct targeted formulas and nourishing ingredients. The Canadian brand offers serums, moisturizers, cleansers, toners, and more, featuring hyaluronic acid, glycerin, and squalane to fit dry skin and dry sensitive skin best. Meanwhile, FRE is widely loved for its targeted product types and nourishing formulas that suit acne-prone skin best, owing to their gentle and effective compositions. These thoughtful formulations work to gently balance and support the complexion while differing in their core ingredient approaches.

The Ordinary is a Canadian skincare brand founded in 2016 and owned by The Estée Lauder Companies Inc. since 2021.

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This page compares some of the most popular The Ordinary and FRE products; for every product of both brands, with a fit score for your own skin, use the Lovi app.

Questions and answers

The Ordinary or FRE: which is better?

The Ordinary offers a much wider variety of products on this page than FRE, with high fit levels for dry, dry sensitive, and oily skin types. Both brands feature fragrance-free formulations across their ranges.

What is the difference between The Ordinary and FRE?

The Ordinary offers a much larger variety of products on this page than FRE, which features only a single argan oil product. Lovi rates the products on this page for The Ordinary as having a High fit for dry skin, dry sensitive skin, and oily skin, while FRE has no specific skin types listed for its best fit.

Which is more affordable, The Ordinary or FRE?

The products on this page for The Ordinary include affordable and great value serums among their commonly mentioned benefits. FRE does not provide pricing details on this page.

When was The Ordinary founded and who owns it compared to FRE?

The Ordinary was founded in 2016 in Canada and has been owned by The Estée Lauder Companies Inc. since 2021, whereas FRE was also founded in 2016 but is independently owned.

What are the main key ingredients found across the products of The Ordinary?

The products on this page from The Ordinary commonly feature hyaluronic acid, glycerin, and squalane as their key ingredients. These components help support skin hydration and moisture retention.

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Research behind their key ingredients

Behind this comparison

Lovi compares products by their fit scores, calculated from the full ingredient list with brand-independent rules our dermatologists and cosmetic chemists build and review, and personalizes every pick with AI trained on the real results of millions of users. Lovi trains its fit score models on a proprietary dataset built from more than 10,000 expert-labeled products and more than 100,000 simulated examples, following an internally consistent methodology presented at Cosmoprof, AMWC, and Skin of Color Update.

How does it fit your skin?

Scan your face, then any product: Lovi shows how well it fits you and what fits even better.