Simple and VR are skincare brands offering thoughtful daily formulas designed for distinct complexions. Simple provides gentle moisturizers, makeup removers, cleansers, and toners featuring niacinamide and glycerin that suit oily and acne-prone skin best, while VR delivers sensory moisturizers tailored for combination, sensitive, and dry skin. Both labels refine their offerings for specific concerns, yet they differ primarily in their ingredient profiles and ideal skin types.
Simple is a British skincare brand founded in 1960 and owned by Unilever PLC since 2011.
This page compares some of the most popular Simple and VR products; for every product of both brands, with a fit score for your own skin, use the Lovi app.
Simple is the better choice on this page because it offers a wide variety of gentle, fragrance-free products like makeup removers and lightweight moisturizers that suit many skin types. Glycerin helps keep skin hydrated, and niacinamide helps reduce pigmentation and signs of aging.
Simple offers a wide selection of fragrance-free cleansers, makeup removers, and moisturizers featuring niacinamide and glycerin, while VR features a single PDRN cream on this page. Lovi rates Simple's Kind to Skin Soothing Facial Toner as Superior for mature skin, whereas VR's PDRN cream achieves a High fit for sensitive skin.
Simple offers a wider variety of moisturizers on this page, which reviewers note are lightweight and value-friendly. Glycerin, a key ingredient across Simple products, helps maintain skin hydration. Both brands feature fragrance-free formulations.
Simple offers lightweight, value-friendly moisturizers on this page, whereas VR only features a single cream without specific value mentions.
Which causes fewer breakouts, Simple or VR?
Simple features products on this page rated with average fits for acne-prone skin, while VR lacks data to make a direct comparison on breakouts.
How do the founding years and ownership structures of Simple and VR differ?
Simple was founded in 1960 in the United Kingdom and has been owned by Unilever PLC since 2011, whereas VR was founded in 2018 and is independently owned.
Which brand offers more product options for sensitive skin, Simple or VR?
Simple offers significantly more product options for sensitive skin than VR, with several items rated High for sensitive skin by Lovi, whereas VR features only a single cream on this page.
What are the key ingredients found across Simple products?
The products on this page for Simple include niacinamide and glycerin as their key ingredients. Glycerin helps provide moisture to the skin.
5-ceramide complex · Skin Pharmacology and Physiology, 2026
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.
