Why do you need a lip liner?

To answer whether Lip Liner is necessary, it's good to understand what Lip Liner actually does. Lip Liner can do a number of jobs to help your makeup look its best.

Primarily, Lip Liner is there to create a sharp crisp edge to your lipstick due to the liner being a pencil with a fine tip. So by applying your lipstick first and then using the tip of the lip liner to slowly edge out the lip shape you can create a fuller balanced lip with a sharp edge with ease. For this its best to use a lip liner that is the same or similar shade to the lipstick you are using. For instance, MAC Ruby Woo Lip Pencil works perfectly with MAC Ruby Woo Lipstick.

However, it can support your makeup in other ways. Lip Liner tends to be more long wearing than lipstick so many people like to use Lip Liner first all over the lip before applying lipstick to make the colour stay on for longer. By using a slightly deep shade of liner to your lipstick you can draw beyond your natural lip shape to make your lips look bigger. Plus the ombre effect created by using a deeper Lip Liner to a lighter lipstick also helps to make your lips look bigger because of the 3D effect that is made. So using MAC Chestnut Lip Liner or MAC Spice Lip Liner with a colour like MAC Velvet Teddy will give you a beautiful full lip that looks natural.

Also, due to Lip Liner being made with less oils than a taditional lipstick, Lip Liner can help prevent lipstick from bleeding into the fine line around the mouth. However, if you find this is an issue that you have, then you can use a lip primer like MAC Prep & Prime Lip that will stop the bleeding plus hold onto your lipstick for longer all while being colourless so allowing it to work on all skin tone and with all lipstick shades. So now you know what Lip Liner does you can decide if Lip Liner is going to help you and your make up look.