If you’re on Skincare Internet, you’re probably at least aware of k-beauty sunscreens. They started to get particularly popular in the U.S. around three years ago. None had as much of a cult following as Krave Beauty’s Beet Shield (though Purito and Klairs sunscreens deserve an honorable mention). This sunscreen was known for its wearability, its beautiful finish, and frequently being out of stock. For my part, it helped me and my husband get into being regular sunscreen wearers, and my fellow modmins at Skincare Fanatics once relentlessly teased me for buying 10 bottles during Black Friday.

It was also known for being the only sunscreen with next generation chemical filters that you could actually buy from a U.S.-based company. (This, later, got them into trouble — but more on that in a moment.) It later also became known as one of the victims of The Great Sunscreen Exodus of early 2021 when independent lab testing found that it did not meet its stated SPF protection (along with Purito, Klairs, and many others — ergo The Great Sunscreen Exodus). I’m not interested in delving into the ethics of all that went down, or how various corners of Skincare Internet might feel about it, nor the history — Krave has done an excellent job of covering that themselves in their Welcome Home post. Rather, this post will be comparing the old Beet Shield with the reformulation, Beet the Sun. Unlike many of the sunscreen reformulations after The Great Sunscreen Exodus, Beet the Sun is, in many ways, the true successor to Beet Shield — but there are some caveats worth noting.

Sunscreen Filters

Beet Shield and Beet the Sun are both chemical sunscreens, meaning they don’t use the often-drying, often-white-casting zinc oxide and titanium dioxide to provide protection. They’re also both broad spectrum, meaning that they provide protection across both UVA and UVB.

While the original Beet Shield was manufactured in Korea, Beet the Sun was manufactured in the United States — and that means very different filters. Much of the world, including the EU, Asia and Australia, allow the usage of newer sunscreen filters, because they have been approved by the various regulatory bodies in those regions. Unfortunately, the U.S. (and Canada) are behind the game. This is an outcome of what goes into obtaining F.D.A. approval for a new drug (which sunscreen filters are considered) and which other folks have addressed at length (one of my favorites being an article last summer by The Atlantic) but to which I will simply say Curse you, Capitalism! Let us have nice things.

Beet Shield

Uvinul A Plus (aka Diethylamino Hydroxybenzoyl Hexyl Benzoate or DHHB) at 3.5%. A UVA filter (320-400 nm) which can be used at percentages up to 10% everywhere but the U.S. and Canada.
Tinosorb S (aka Bis-Ethylhexyloxyphenol Methoxyphenyl Triazine or Bemotrizinol) at 3%. A broad-spectrum filter (so UVA and UVB, or 280-400 nm) which is, of course, available in Europe, Australia and Asia, but not the U.S.
Uvinul T 150 (aka Ethylhexyl Triazone or Octyltriazone) at 2%. A UVB filter approved to use at percentages up to 5% everywhere but — you guessed it — the U.S. and Canada.
Amiloxate (aka Isoamyl p-Methoxycinnamate or Neo Heliopan E1000) is a UVB filter with some UVA coverage (290-340 nm). It is approved at percentages up to 10% in the EU, but not at all, of course, in the U.S.
Parsol SLX (aka Polysilicone-15) is a UVB filter (290-320 nm) which is also approved at percentages up to 10% in most of the world beside the U.S.

Big ups to incidecoder.com for still having the old formulation on their site, and for being such a fount of knowledge as it pertains to pretty much anything ingredient-related. These filters are known for being easy to wear, photostable, non-irritating, and generally Much Nicer than the older generation chemical filters. It is worth noting that while Beet Shield did eventually not meet their SPF 50+ PA++++ claims, that the filters themselves are not at fault — rather, the manufacturers of various Korean sunscreens featured in The Great Exodus didn’t do their due diligence across various dimensions.

Beet The Sun

Homosalate at 10%. A UVB filter (295-315 nm) which is known for being a relatively weak filter, and not very photostable. 10% is the maximum percentage allowed.
Octisalate (aka Ethylhexyl Salicylate or Octyl Salicylate, Octisalate) at 5%, approved at percentages up to 10%. Another weak UVB filter (295-315 nm) typically used to support other chemical formulas. According to Krave Beauty, it also helps with the water-resistance of the formula.
Avobenzone (aka Butyl Methoxydibenzoylmethane) at 3%. It is known for being the only UVA chemical filter (310-400 nm) approved for use in the U.S. It is also known for not being very photostable.
Octocrylene at 3%. It is a UVB filter with some UVA protection and is the most stable of these chemical filters. It is usually used to help stabilize formulas, as well as to increase their water-resistance.

Some of these chemical filters, like avobenzone, have a fair amount of controversy around them, and can be irritating to some. Unfortunately, the fact remains that these and few others are the only chemical sunscreen filters available to the U.S. market. Their lack of photostability is part of why reapplication is so important — Beet the Sun can’t maintain its SPF 40 PA+++ over time without you doing your part, too.

Other Noteworthy Ingredients

True to their names, both Beet Shield and Beet the Sun include beet root extract. On one hand, it’s pretty fun to have a product intended to keep you from turning red leaning heavily on a plant that is doomed to turn you and everything around it red. On the other hand, it’s also a great skincare ingredient. It has some natural moisturizing factors to it, it’s antioxidant (hooray, plants!) and even has some anti-inflammatory benefits.

Past the beet root extract, however, the extra “nice to haves” in these formulas differ dramatically.

Beet Shield

Alcohol, known to be drying to some skin types (including mine) but extremely helpful for providing a good “dry down” on sunscreens, and commonly used for that purpose.
Glycerin, a humectant.
Lithospermum Erythrorhizon Root Extract, a wound healing and anti-inflammatory plant extract. It can also function as a colorant.
Macadamia Ternifolia Seed Oil, an emollient oil with a high oleic acid content.
Allantoin, a soothing, anti-inflammatory ingredient originally from comfrey but usually synthesized.
Epigallocatechin Gallate (aka EGCG), one of the bioactive compounds in green tea. It is a polyphenol, and known to be a great antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and anticarcinogenic ingredient.
Sodium Ascorbyl Phosphate (aka SAP) is a derivative of vitamin C, ergo the “ascorbyl” in the name. This derivative is more stable and less irritating than ascorbic acid, while still providing benefits in terms of antioxidant protection, collagen boosting and skin brightening.
Resveratrol is the polyphenol found in red grapes. It is known for its antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and anticarcinogenic properties.

Given that sunscreen is all about protecting your skin from the sun, Krave Beauty, as well as other k-beauty brands, find it a great step to also include additional antioxidants. Indeed, they are often considered to “boost” your sunscreen, since antioxidants help protect from the oxidative stress that comes from pollution and UV. The original Beet Shield was all about that.

Beet the Sun

Bisabolol, one of the bioactive parts of chamomile, known for its anti-inflammatory and soothing properties.
Hyaluronic Acid, a humectant.
Salix Alba Bark Extract (aka willow bark extract), a plant extract with skin-soothing, antioxidant properties due to the polyphenols and flavonoids in it. It is often considered a gentler version of salicylic acid, though it is more commonly used in formulas to manage sebum than to exfoliate.
Solidago Virgaurea Extract (aka goldenrod extract), a plant extract with skin-conditioning properties, meaning that it can soften and hydrate the skin.
Tocopheryl Acetate, a derivative of vitamin E, ergo the tocopheryl in the name. It is an antioxidant that also shows significant promise as an anti-inflammatory, particularly as it pertains to sun damage itself.

Beet the Sun, on the other hand, seems more concerned with soothing and repairing damage from UV, as well as leaving the condition of the skin better than it started.

User Experience

Ingredients and filters are great and all, but the thing that makes a sunscreen good is whether you will actually want to wear it. After all, if you like your sunscreen well enough to wear it regularly, you’ll reap the rewards, regardless of the filters and other ingredients it might contain.

Price

I don’t believe in expensive sunscreens. Or rather, I do know they exist and have used them, but when you’re supposed to use over 1 mL of sunscreen in every application, some sunscreens can start to feel very expensive very fast. Luckily, neither Beet Shield nor Beet the Sun are particularly expensive: both are $20 for 50 mL, or under 50 cents per application. This is about $5 more than many k-beauty sunscreens on the market right now, though Krave Beauty does offer a subscription for Beet the Sun which knocks the price down to $19. (Prices in USD)

Packaging

The big improvement with Beet the Sun is the packaging. Beet Shield came in a hard, plastic bottle used by many retailers at the time. While this was good for keeping it protected from the sun, it made it impossible to get out all of the sunscreen, and was a real problem for folks with limited mobility. The new Beet the Sun comes in a tube, and while it will attempt to run out quickly if you, say, subject it to changes in elevation (it did not love coming back to Colorado from California last weekend), this is great for ensuring you actually get most of those 50 mLs of product.

Look and Feel

Neither formula feels heavy, and both passed the husband test — my other half has happily been using this for the past few weeks.

Conclusion

If this were a true Face Off, and the original Beet Shield were still available and had been shown to actually meet its SPF 50 PA++++ rating, I must admit that it would come out on top. I love using new generation filters, I think the formulation was really thoughtful, and I wore it on many, many occasions none the worse for wear. Unfortunately, that’s not the world we live in.

That said, Beet the Sun is a great example of a k-beauty-style chemical sunscreen that’s available in the U.S., of which there are very very few — Thank You Farmer and Neogen are the only other ones I’m aware of. It has much of the lovely wearability of k-beauty sunscreens, and is available without having to import from overseas, so if you want to see the fuss without dealing with k-beauty retailers, it’s a great option. However, if you already love k-beauty sunscreens and are getting them shipped to you on the regular, I don’t know that I’d say you have to go out and get this. Notably, it’s a lower SPF value than many chemical sunscreens from Korea, and the U.S. filters can be more irritating.

Remember, the best sunscreen is the one you’ll wear!