Lasting Profiles
Bean
Beauty
Mung bean is used for soothing, plant-forward skincare formulas.
What's Happening
What is the Bean Beauty trend?
Bean Beauty: Mung bean, a legume traditionally used in food, is gaining popularity in skincare for its gentle, naturally beneficial properties. Within the beauty landscape, this unconventional ingredient is used to help calm irritated skin, absorb excess oil, and aid in balancing complexions.
Insight
The consumer insight behind the Bean Beauty trend
As skin sensitivity rises—driven by environmental stressors, over-exfoliation, and increasingly complex routines—consumers are gravitating toward gentler, food-derived skincare ingredients. Due to these factors and a growing demand for "food skincare," brands are turning to mung bean, valued for its calming, oil-absorbing, and antioxidant properties. Positioned as a mild alternative to harsher actives, mung bean supports skin balance and barrier comfort while aligning with preferences for natural, low-irritation formulations.
Evidence
Examples of the Bean Beauty trend
Soothing Mung Bean Skincare
The mixsoon Mung Bean Seed Essence Relieves Uncomfortable, Red Skin
Skincare innovations that emphasize minimal and natural ingredients align with the growing consumer preference for clean beauty products.
Depuffing Mung Bean Masks
The beplain Mung Bean Cooling & Slim Face Mask Features Microcell Fabric
The beauty industry is seeing a surge in innovative skincare products that offer specialized treatment benefits and sensory enhancement.
Bean-Infused Wash-Off Masks
The House of Dohwa Mung Bean Wash Off Mask Supports Dry & Oily Skin
The skincare and cosmetics industry continually evolves with the integration of new, effective natural ingredients targeting diverse skin issues.
Mung Bean Cleansing Oils
beplain's Cleansing Oil is Lightweight, Moisturizing & Deep-Cleansing
The innovation with mung bean cleansing oils in K-beauty reflects the industry's ongoing commitment to blending traditional botanicals with cutting-edge skincare science.
Workshop question
How can your product strategy adapt to consumers seeking supportive ingredients?
Trend themes
Themes within the Bean Beauty trend
Three behaviours holding the trend togetherFood-Skincare Crossover
A surge in food-derived actives like mung bean points to ingredient pipelines that blur culinary and cosmetic categories, enabling edible-origin formulations that prioritize ingestible-safety profiles and consumer familiarity.
Gentle-Active Alternatives
Rising skin sensitivity is fueling demand for mild, barrier-supporting substitutes for harsh actives, creating space for novel low-irritation molecules and delivery systems that achieve efficacy without compromise.
Multitasking Botanical Formulas
Consumers favor multifunctional products that combine soothing, oil-control and hydrating benefits, indicating potential for concentrated botanical complexes and hybrid formats that replace multi-step routines.
Industry implications
What the Bean Beauty trend means for industry
Where the trend changes the playbookPersonal-Care Cosmetics
Formulation and branding opportunities exist for companies developing gentle, plant-forward product lines and differentiated sensory formats that cater to sensitive and mixed skin types.
Functional-Foods And Nutraceuticals
Ingredient suppliers and supplement brands could leverage mung bean's bioactive profile to create oral-beauty solutions and cross-category claims tied to skin health.
Textile-And-Wearable-Beauty
Innovations in microcell fabrics and delivery substrates present possibilities for single-use and reusable mask platforms that enhance ingredient transfer, cooling effects, and fit.
Trend signals
Trend signals for Bean Beauty
Trend score 5.6 out of 10, from popularity 56%, activity 47%, freshness 64%.
- Gen Alpha (not a primary audience)
- Gen Z
- Millennial
- Gen X
- Boomer (not a primary audience)