10 Best Korean Makeup Techniques & How To Do Them

We may earn a commission if you click on a link, but at no extra cost to you. Read our disclosure policy for information.

Written by Skye Rhodes Last Updated: Sep 2, 2024

In the beauty world, there’s a ton of trends that marks the way for new and edgy styles, so to help you achieve those cool looks we’ve compiled a list of the best Korean makeup techniques and how to do them.

But none of them compare to the sophistication, urban, youthful, and fresh looks that the K – beauty brings for us.

Korean culture is all about being your best self, in and out, and this includes caring about your looks.

K – Beauty has hit the trends because it works from the inside to the outside, in other words, we work in getting a nice looking and clean canvas (our faces) before we start with the art.

A proper skincare routine is the first and most sacred step to achieve beautiful Korean makeup and it allows us to apply amazing techniques that Korean culture has for us to shine.

Contents

10 Best Korean Makeup Techniques And How To Do Them

So, we’re about to discuss the 10 best Korean makeup techniques to accomplish a striking look that will wow everyone wherever you go.

1. Skincare Routine Is The Sacred First Step

The very first and most crucial step to achieve stunning Korean makeup is taking care of your face.

The 10 steps Korean skincare routine is trending hard in the beauty world because it’s more than a morning/night task, it’s a lifestyle.

Korean girls begin with their face care since they’re young, and that’s the reason why they tend to look fresh, healthy and wrinkle-free even though they’re in their senior years (A habit that every person that wants their skin to shine should adopt).

Check here the golden 10 steps for the famous Korean skincare routine.

Korean skincare routine

Eye makeup removal with good makeup remover or cleansing tissues
Cleansing with an oil cleanser and face massages to remove every drop of foundation and stimulate circulation
Exfoliate with a natural scrub at least twice a month to remove dead skin
Refresh your face with soft toners to remove any residue and balance your PH
Soak your face in a face treatment essence to speeding your cell turnover and make your skin brighter and smoother
Apply Ampoules (That we know as Serums) to clear your skin from sunspots
Use sheet masks twice a week to refresh and moisturize your skin
Put on some eye cream taping it gently on the eye area to recover from dark circles
Moisturise! – This is the key to get the glow that every Korean woman is looking for without the need to put on a ton of highlighter (apply night cream to maximize the effect of the routine)
Always use BB cream with SPF for your sun care, this prevents skin cancer, sun spots, acne, and wrinkles

It seems a lot of work but when you get used to doing it, you will see the difference.

None of the following techniques are going to work perfectly if you don’t have a solid skincare routine because to look younger and healthy, less is more; but when less is more, you need a good canvas to work!

2. No – Makeup Or “Chok – Chok”

The Chok – Chok technique is one of the most popular among the K – Pop artists that are so in right now.

Chok – Chok technique involves a subtle makeup that makes your face glow under the lights without excessive contouring.

To get this ‘No – makeup’ makeup look, your best friend is the moisturizer and face mist.

The first thing that you need to do to start is moisturizing your skin and spray face mist on your face (Mist is like setting spray but with skin-friendly components that give you a natural look instead of only fixate your makeup).

For a No – makeup look the best thing that you can do is to avoid contouring, but if you want to incorporate it just focus on using it on one feature only (Cheekbones or jawline) to avoid a heavy look.

We complete the look with natural eyebrows, a lot of blush, a Blooming blossom lip look, and use your face mist spray again!

You will have a look that’s going to make heads turn when you pass by with your natural and fresh vibe.

Again, for this to work out, you need to moisturize your skin.

This is vital to accomplish a natural and youthful look without using a ton of makeup.

Also, take care of your hair.

A healthy and clean hair is going to prevent acne outbreaks that can ruin your perfect skin goal.

If you want an extra shiny outcome, use some highlighter under your eyebrow, a little bit of eye shadow (preferring coral or brown colors) in the lower corner of your eye following your lash line, lip gloss, and finish everything with mascara.

3. Korean Contour

Contouring was the star of makeup a few months ago, but with new generations, new trends come along too.

It’s time to say goodbye to excessive contouring and hello to a fresh and glowy look with just a few highlights or shades to enhance your bone structure.

You can choose between highlighting your cheekbones to look younger, or just shade and sculpt a bit your jawline, but not both.

Another way to get soft contouring is by using bronzing powder instead of actual contour.

You just apply the bronzing powder on the hollows of your cheeks and then blend it with some CC cream to make it look smooth and natural.

The bronzing powder is going to give you a youthful vibe and the BB cream will smooth the edges of the bronzer to make it look more natural.

Also, you can use just a bit of highlighter in your heart zone: forehead, nose, cheekbones, and chin, but you need to choose between bronzing powder and highlighter, never use both.

For any of these techniques to work perfectly, you need to moisturize your skin before you blend your contour because a moisturized skin allows the makeup to settle well and without spots or irregularities.

This is the key to the Korean contour and to avoid a heavy makeup look.

You’ll look stunning, young and nobody will notice your contouring.

4. The Undone Brow

The eyebrow world has changed too and the natural look strikes again in this area.

We used to let our eyebrows thin as a thread but when years went by, we started to let them grow while still maintaining the structure.

Now we’ve come to the natural structure of the brows era.

Just soft definition with a brush and pencil, and removing a few hairs should be enough to get them a clean but natural look that Korean makeup uses the most.

We like them thick and naturally shaped, and it’s the perfect way to look younger and sweet.

If you’re the type of girl that wants a structured brow shape, just apply a bit more color in the middle of the brow with a pencil or with a brush and some brown shadow.

Also, remember that Korean style prefers a straight brow with a little arc in the end so you can plug a few hairs away and make your brow shape a bit straighter or you can just use your eyebrow powder to correct your brow shape.

It’s better to leave the hard edges and the dyeing behind our backs, and welcoming brushes and pencils to mold your brows, and give them just a little bit of contrast to your natural face.

5. The Eye makeup

For the eyes, Koreans think too that less y more.

The gold standard for the K – beauty world is to maintain a youthful vibe for the longest time possible, so keeping your eyes looking big and bright is the real goal.

There are a lot of techniques for eye makeup up that can make your eyes look bigger, but we’re going to discuss the very best of the Korean world.

Best techniques for Korean eye makeup

Minimum color: Simplicity is the rule to follow when it comes to Korean eye makeup

Brown, pink, and coral are the favorites to enhance the eyes, giving them a neutral and profound but simple look.

You just need to choose a color slightly darker than your skin tone and apply it with a brush in your eyelid, and you will be ready to go.

Extra shine: To give a little extra shine to your eyes, simply apply a shimmery eye shadow in the center of your eyelid and below your lower lash line
Aegyo sal: Also known as smiley eyes consist of making our eye bags look puffy to resemble a younger look

There is even a specific surgical procedure to make your eyes look like this permanently, but you can do it cheaply and quickly using a white pencil and draw a line under your bags or apply white eyeshadow to make them look puffier.

If you want to achieve real Korean makeup, you need to try these techniques.

You can also combine your eye makeup with the puppy eyeliner technique, and I’m sure you are going to look stunning!

Remember to cover your dark circles (I will tell an easy way to cover them up just a couple of numbers down this list) for your makeup to work.

You can also use eye masks (there is a lot of variety in the market to adjust to your skin’s needs) that can hydrate and reduce a bit of those dark circles under your eyes.

Is also easier to do the Aegyo sal technique when you’re well-hydrated and clean, so don’t forget to pamper your eyes too once in a while!

6. The Puppy Eyeliner

Almost all the techniques that we can find in the K – beauty world are related to natural, fresh, young, and we can even say innocent looks… Until we get to my precious, puppy eyeliner.

The puppy eyeliner makeup consists of creating a line that drops downwards instead of upwards of the cat-eye, giving the illusion of a bigger and more rounded eye.

The blackest of the black eyeliners is the favorite among Korean girls and my personal favorite too.

There’s no better way to get a cute but sexy look than with a big black eyeliner to balance the simplicity of the Korean makeup.

The puppy eyeliner makeup looks beautiful to everyone, but it can be a bit difficult to achieve it and make it look symmetrical.

That’s why I decided to drop here some tips to achieve your puppy eyeliner as a professional.

Tips for achieving your puppy eyeliner

Do the eyeliner in three parts: First thru the upper line, then extend the tail about 3mm and last thru the inner corner to the eye
The spoon – You can use a spoon as a guide to make your puppy eyeliner straight and symmetrical (remember, is a downwards line)
Plastic tape – Cut a little piece of plastic tape and put it as a guide
Line outer third of lower lash line for more definition

These tips can make your life a lot easier when it comes to making your eyeliner smooth and perfect to complete your K-beauty look.

7. Say Goodbye To Dark Circles

Dark circles have always being a nightmare to women all over the world, and when concealer was invented we had a break from look like pandas all day.

Concealer is my personal best friend because my dark circles have been with me since I can remember, and choosing the right color or knowing the right amount of concealer to cover them has always been a problem for me.

We can end up looking like a ghost or it could even make us look old and wrinkle if we don’t do it right.

For that reason, professional stylists and makeup artists are using Korean techniques.

Using Korean techniques we can cover our dark circles but with a natural look, and I will teach you how to do that in just a few minutes.

To start, you need to find the right color to balance the color of your dark circles.

Dark circles can come in a lot of different tones, and that depends on the cause of the problem.

So we need to smooth these tones down to make easier the concealer job.

Basic colors that can help you hide your dark circles:

For red under your eyes, it’s better to use green
For yellow spots, use lilac
For really dark circles, use the color salmon or peach

Now that you picked the color we are going to use a Korean trick: Use eye shadow first, not actual concealer.

There’re a lot of colors in the concealer universe, but they can look thick and accentuate your wrinkles, so Korean makeup artists prefer eye shadow because they look brighter and fresh.

Tap gently in your under-eye area with the eye shadow until you cover your dark circles, and after that, use a small amount of concealer to blend it.

You will notice a smoother and more natural look.

Your under-eye area is going to look brighter and is going to blend perfectly with your skin.

8. Blush, Blush, Blush

Blushes in bright colors are the hit in the K – Beauty trends.

A splash of color in the right places gives you a youthful and healthy look.

Everything that traditional Korean women are looking for is keeping themselves looking young, and with good health for the longest time possible.

Just apply your blush on the apple of your cheeks to make them look bouncy, and for an extra shiny look, put on some highlight just above your cheeks following your bone structure.

Another way to get some shine on your cheekbones it’s mixing CC cream with lip lacquer.

Apply this on your cheeks and I assure you will have a healthy flush on them.

You can also apply your eyeshadow, and use it as a blush to match your eyes and cheeks.

This is a more playful technique that’s going to make you look stunning and it’s perfect for a night event.

Combining these techniques with a good skincare routine will make you look fresh, happy, and fun at any time of the day, and you’ll look ready for any occasion.

9. Blooming Blossom Lips Look

Following the natural vibe and the simplicity trend, we found the blooming blossom lips look.

Perfect for getting that instant plumpness that a lot of us want, keeping our fresh style.

For this look, we have to follow just two simple steps and we will be ready to go!

First, apply some colored lipstick in the center of your lips (Preferring pink, red, violet, and all its variations).

And second, brush outwards to blur the edges and achieve that flower petals look that gives the name to this technique.

What we’re looking for is a girly look, like if you’ve just put a cherry lollipop between your lips and the color has stayed on them.

And as a final touch, you can use a little bit of transparent lip gloss to blend your color and make it look brighter.

Applying this technique will take you about 1 minute, you’ll look effortlessly beautiful and your lipstick it’s going to last for an eternity!

10. Powder Your Scalp

It may sound weird because we might not be used to powder our heads but a lot of famous stylists in the world are summing to this trend.

This technique consists basically of found a colored powder similar to your hair color and use a brush to dab it in spots near your hairline.

Powder your scalp is a trick that’s going to make your face look thinner, enhance your bone structure, and make your hair voluminous and healthy.

You can also use hair powder to hide your visible gray hairs when you’re in a rush and there’s no time to go to the salon.

This is a new trend and not even a bit conventional for western culture, but a lot of women are choosing this technique to look younger and fresh.

Extra Tip: Mascara!

To give an extra pop to your eyes, always curl your lashes and use mascara!

You can use regular black mascara, or if you’re feeling edgy, you can use blue, red, pink, or any other color of mascara.

If you don’t have colored mascara you can use eye shadows.

Just apply your regular mascara and before it dries apply the eye shadow of your choice.

For more durability, you can apply some transparent mascara to secure the eye shadow to your lashes.

Or, you can just simply use a black pencil, and color the waterline of your upper eyelid to make your eyes pop (be careful and try not to do this if your eyes are too sensitive).

This will complete a makeup worthy of a K-pop queen!

Final Thoughts

There’re a lot of other techniques out there in the world that Korean culture uses to remain with that porcelain look that has made their routines and methods so famous, but this list sums up the very basis of the K – beauty standards.

The best part of these Korean makeup techniques is that you can combine them to get a beautiful look that you can use at any time of the day.

You can also continue exploring the Korean world to know what’s the best cosmetics, colors, and techniques for your skin.

Remember that the best component of beautiful makeup is a great attitude to make it shine like no other!

So, continue learning about your skin, don’t forget to visit a dermatologist if you have any issues that won’t go away with normal cleaning, always clean your skin and use SFP cream!

10 Best Korean Makeup Techniques & How To Do Them

10 Best Korean Makeup Techniques And How To Do Them