L'Oreal Infallible Never Fail eye liner

I picked up the L'Oreal Infallible Never Fail eye liner in Navy last week to get to the $15 mark required for an ExtraBucks deal at CVS. I figured it was worth a shot since I only had one blue pencil liner that is brighter than I prefer for everyday looks. The full retail price for this liner was $9.79.

Claims/Features:

• Rich creme formula for smooth application
• Smudge-resistant, up to 16 hours
• Built-in sharpener and smudger
• Ophthalmologist tested
• Suitable for sensitive eyes and contact lens wearers

 I thought the smudger was interesting because it was rubbery instead of the typical sponge tip. I'm guessing that might make it more sanitary because bacteria can't build up in it, but that's just a guess. I would also assume that it would hold up better than the sponge-tip smudgers.

When I swatched this liner for the first time, I wasn't thrilled. It didn't swatch very well.

In the above picture, the top swatch is one swipe with the pencil. As you can see, there isn't a lot of color payoff, especially when you compare it with something like Urban Decay's 24/7 liner pencils. The second swatch is two swipes, and the third is multiple. The last swatch was lightly blended out with the smudger tip.

Note: I just swatched this liner again, and the color-payoff with one swipe is a lot better than the above picture, so it appears to have softened up a bit with some use.

Now on to the standard staying-power test. After letting the above swatches sit on my hand for a few minutes, I rubbed them with my fingers with a good amount of pressure and speed. Here are the results:

Not exactly outstanding results for something that claims to be smudge-resistant (notice that it doesn't claim to be smudge-PROOF).

On Monday, I wore this liner to work, and here's how it looked when I got home (sorry there isn't a before picture):

This picture was taken after about 9-10 hours of wear. I do still have color on the outer corner of my eye, which is good. That tends to be where liner disappears on me. However, you can see that it looks faded and the color has smudged down a little bit under my eyes. From a normal distance, this wouldn't be noticeable, so I was happy enough with it. If I were going out to dinner in the evening though, I would probably feel the need to do a quick touch-up before heading back out the door. While I can imagine that there would be a decent amount of product left at the 16-hour mark, I don't think it would hold up well enough to live up to its 16-hour claim.

Overall, I would say this is a decent liner. I will continue to use it because I do like the color of it, but I don't plan on repurchasing it. There are better liners out there. From my somewhat limited collection of pencil liners (I used to almost exclusively wet-line with eye shadows), I much prefer the Physician's Formula Shimmer Strips eye liner trios. They are more smudge-resistant and you can get a pack of three for about $1 more than I paid for the L'Oreal liner.

What are your favorite pencil liners? Have you tried these L'Oreal Infallible ones? What was your impression of them?