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In the Red Light Wars, publicists, too, are soldiers. Marie-Laure Fournier, the owner of an eponymous public relations firm which represents a variety of beauty clients, entered battle triumphantly. Her black glasses are a signature, as is her reliable ability to commit grand acts of PR—like placing her client Currentbody’s signature LED face mask in an episode of Netflix’s Emily in Paris—and her occasionally verbose press releases, like the one that arrived in editors’ inboxes in the early days of battle, August 2024, subject line: Unmasking Lyma & And Its LED Lies.

LED stands for light emitting diode, the acronym for a semiconductor that emits light when an electrical current runs through it, and describes the technology that uses light of a certain wavelength to produce an anti-inflammatory reaction in the skin, with the goal of making it appear glowier instantly and glassier over time. These wavelengths, between 630 and 700 nanometers, appear red in the visible spectrum (whereas the wavelengths of the LED inside the overhead lighting at your office appear white), and have given rise to “red light therapy.” LED treatments are often administered in dermatologist offices and spas, but have been cleared by the FDA (cleared, not approved—more on that in a moment) to be manufactured in at-home devices like Currentbody’s. This has created a growing, glowing, billion-dollar segment of the beauty market and fierce competition among purveyors of this radiant technology. And consumers are lapping it up.

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania released a study a few months ago that, from November 2019 to November 2024, there was an average 118% increase in search volume for red light therapy-related terms as compared with that of other skin-care words and phrases (like “exfoliation” and “chemical peel”). As of February 2024, “red LED light therapy” had amassed more than 70 million views on TikTok, according to their analysis. The social media app has “significantly increased public interest in red-light therapy, surpassing that for traditional skin care treatments,” concludes the study. Also concluded: “This attention came despite limited scientific understanding of the long-term effects and safety, especially for home use.”

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It was a press release for the Lyma Laser, a nearly $3,000 device by the company Lyma Life, that captured Fournier’s attention and immediate ire back in 2024. The document summarized a “world-first study” that had pitted Lyma’s proprietary laser technology against the much larger LED category, claiming the Lyma Laser device performed 100 times better than LED masks and was the most powerful beauty device on the market. “What does that even mean?” Fournier wrote in response. “Wouldn’t a 100x more powerful device blast your skin completely off your face?”

Lyma says its device—which resembles a sleek flashlight—is a laser, not an LED device, the former implying deeper skin penetration and more effective results. Its laser emits a beam of a single wavelength that is “selectively absorbed into the skin,” according to its marketing, to promote skin healing and recovery. Both LEDs and lasers fall under the aims of something called photobiomodulation, which just means using light to help the skin heal itself. Lyma made the argument that their technology is a more refined version of current LED technology, and that its performance justifies its cost.

Fournier’s email also included a link to the Lyma laser’s 510(k), the documentation filed on behalf of the brand for FDA clearance. The shade cast by sharing Lyma’s 510(k) came from the brand’s indication of two LED light therapy products—not lasers—as predicates, complicating its marketing.

In January 2024, the UK’s Advertising Standards Advisory council reviewed the Lyma’s best-on-the-market and 100x-more-powerful claims and provided an exhaustive report that referenced the company’s efforts to substantiate its assertions with peer-reviewed studies, many of which were deemed irrelevant or not admissable to the council, who told the company to pull their Instagram ad and furthermore “to ensure they did not make claims about the efficacy or performance of the [laser] in the absence of adequate substantiation.” Lyma Life refuted the ASA’s ruling. They told Allure early last year that further research into the biological effectiveness of their near-infrared laser light “will be published in an independent scientific journal in the next few months.” When we followed up last month, the company shared a preliminary preclinical and clinical study published in the Aesthetic Surgery Journal Open Forum last year that “demonstrated [the LYMA Laser’s] superior ability to influence gene expression in healthy skin compared to an equivalent LED device.” In the study, 20 patients with chronic wounds used the newer LYMA Laser PRO for four weeks and their wounds healed more fully than those in the placebo group. A representative for the company added: “The UK ruling occurred prior to LYMA receiving FDA clearance. The LYMA Laser PRO underwent a rigorous process to gain this clearance, which we received in April 2025.” (The Pro version is marketed as three times as powerful, with a larger surface area, and goes for more than double the price—$5,995—of the original.)

In its previous statement to Allure, Lyma upheld a distinction between their laser and LED products. “The term 'red light' is broadly used to explain the category but that is quite misleading,” a spokesperson said, noting that the red light seen on Lyma’s device does not mean that it is emitting 700-nanometer light but merely indicates it is switched on; the laser light itself is clear. The Lyma Laser works “completely differently,” and the brand hopes to educate the public on the difference.

For my part, I have a difficult time grasping the distinction. So do other beauty customers. Fournier’s release served less to inform the beauty press than to defend her client by striking back at a competitor attempting to undermine its integrity; a typical skirmish in the Red Light Wars. With little regulation on these devices, consumer confusion abounds about how they actually work (not to mention which ones are even using red light at all), and how much is too much to spend on them.

“Honestly, I think it all comes down to marketing,” says a senior level executive at one LED brand who asked to remain anonymous. After we spoke, she had a meeting scheduled with a spa owner, who she was hoping might ditch their LED tech for hers.

Under these circumstances, where even those who employ the technology are unsure about “the best,” consumers are left to fend for themselves. They’re shopping anyway. According to affiliate marketing firm ShopMy, in December 2025, the highest-grossing beauty product on its platform was Currentbody’s LED mask. Omnilux’s LED mask came in third, and the Lyma Laser was eighth.

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The Red Light Wars began, in earnest, around 2020. In the grand scheme of things, beauty had been booming, but at-home devices were slow to catch on. In 2017, Neutrogena tried and failed to sustain a drugstore LED mask—which utilized a combination of blue and red light—after it was deemed to possibly cause eye injury among photosensitive people or those with existing eye conditions. But earlier entrants, like Omnilux, have been planning their moment for decades.

Omnilux’s first at-home LED devices, the New-U and Clear-U, were FDA cleared in 2008 and 2009, respectively. In 2020, Omnilux released what has become the brand’s hero product for consumers: a floppy, portable mask called the Omnilux Contour, which retails for $395. Ads for the mask have run on TikTok, YouTube and Facebook, and between episodes of The Real Housewives on NBC’s Peacock app. The Omnilux mask reflects the very latest in LED technology: a flat but flexible fit, studded with diodes trained to emit light at a cosmetically beneficial wavelength.

Most at-home beauty devices require the FDA’s blessing to be sold. They do not however require FDA approval, which involves sheaths of paperwork and batteries of lab tests to prove that a drug or device or vaccine comes with minimal risk and measurable benefit. Instead, products can receive FDA’s 510(k) clearance if “they are deemed safe and substantially equivalent to existing devices,” a spokesperson for the agency told Allure.

That existing cleared device, though, could have been cleared decades ago. (The 510(k) clearance process for medical devices has been the same for 50 years, despite calls for more regulation from organizations including the National Academy of Medicine.) And it—nor the new device seeking clearance on its back—did not necessarily have to show clinical studies proving its effectiveness (the requirements vary from device to device, per the FDA spokesperson). Basically, “FDA-cleared” in no way means that the exact LED mask you’re considering has clinical research behind its claims.

LED products have gained much steam on social media, where they lend themselves to arresting selfie photography. On TikTok, #redlight and its related hashtags (#redlighttherapy, #LEDmask) continue to rack up a few hundred thousand posts a month; they fly off the virtual shelves on marketplaces like Amazon, where LED mask purveyors Dr. Dennis Gross and SolaWave have opened storefronts. Among the site’s best-sellers, though, are low-cost alternatives that will run you no more than $65, which can pose real dangers. Shereene Idriss, MD, a board-certified dermatologist in New York City, recalled with horror when a patient suffered face burns from using an LED mask from Amazon; the diodes were, in fact, small incandescent bulbs, like Christmas lights. Aside from a lower-than-normal price tag, a telltale sign of a fake LED mask is if it gets hot.

But generally speaking, in most cases, there’s little harm you can do to your skin with an at-home LED device, says Mona Gohara, MD, a board-certified dermatologist and clinical professor at the Yale School of Medicine Department of Dermatology. She does suggest, though, that patients who have skin conditions that can be triggered by light or heat, like melasma, steer clear of them (bearing in mind that melanated skin is more prone to hyperpigmentation in general). For acne patients, she recommends LED masks that utilize blue light around 415 nanometers, particularly when they can’t use topical medications like spironolactone due to allergies or sensitives. Or maybe they’re pregnant or nursing. “There are a lot of nuanced situations where a blue light mask may be helpful for acne,” says Dr. Gohara.

She’s not as quick to recommend red light, which “is more about firming, minimizing fine lines, and achieving a ‘glow,’” she says. “There are a lot of other, better-studied ways to do that.” (For those curious: retinol and SPF, she says.) Some dermatologists seldom recommend LED of any color at all. “It's always been one of those murky areas within laser and light technologies,” says Tina Alster, a board-certified dermatologist in Washington DC. “It's just we don't know exactly how they work.” Neither Dr. Gohara nor Dr. Alster use an at-home LED device on their own skin, though Dr. Alster does provide LED treatments in her office to help reduce redness and swelling after laser treatments like Fraxel. Pressed for an at-home recommendation, Dr. Alster says the more diodes the better, which is why she prefers full-face masks to wands.

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Most experts say that the benefits of LED can be observed over time, but only with strict adherence to its protocol. A systematic review of 31 randomly controlled trials of LED therapy for dermatologic ends, published in the journal Lasers in Surgery and Medicine, determined that blue light is most effective on inflammatory conditions like acne or herpes when used once or twice daily. The evidence of the cosmetic benefits of red light, like plumper, brighter skin, is more anecdotal. My friend Bela, a publicist, attributes her flawless skin to her daily Omnilux habit (she’s partial to the Contour model); she’s been on it for years. So has Adam, a grooming writer who swears by Dr. Dennis Gross’ white-and-rose-gold mask ($455). Both say that consistency is the key to unlocking LED’s benefits.

Dr. Alster agrees‚ and adds that she rarely encounters patients with the discipline to consistently use an LED mask regularly, even if it is easy. (And even if new category entrants like Therabody are souping up their masks with added benefits like scalp massage to create more incentive.) “All I can do is wash my face twice a day and slap on my vitamin C,” Dr. Alster says. “And I’m a dermatologist.” For this reason and others, these devices were slow to penetrate until March 2020, when stay-at-home orders slowed the pace of busy lives.

Convincing consumers to use a LED device should be simple, given how straightforward it is in theory. In practice, education is a slow and challenging process. “It looks too good to be true,” says Lotti Tyson, the brand director at Déesse Pro, which sells a $1,900 mask created in collaboration with aesthetician Shani Darden. “You're like, ‘well, hang on, this thing has very few contraindications, it doesn't cause any sensitivity.’ That does sound too good to be true.”

While red light is still, in comparison with other wavelengths, the most researched for its effects on skin, others—like near-infrared at approximately 800 nanometers, or yellow light near 590—have been incorporated into new masks and do have some official, if scarce, literature to back them up. (A new LED mask by the brand Sunlighten also incorporates green light to serve as a “full-face wrinkle treatment and mood booster,” according to an email sent to editors. None of the dermatologists we spoke to for this story have seen clinical evidence of green light being effective for mood-boosting or wrinkle-treating, but early studies show it can help reduce headaches.) A few independent studies have shown that near-infrared light—as opposed to far-infared light, which can be used in medical settings to treat inflammatory and cardiovascular conditions—penetrates the skin more deeply than other wavelengths to help with wound healing. At the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas earlier this month, L’Oréal Paris announced that it will launch a mask that incorporates both near-infrared and red light sometime in 2027. Yellow light, like red, has shown some promise in small studies for treating redness and rosacea, as well as soothing inflammation following in-office treatments like lasers.

Déesse says that when they looked into incorporating blue light into their devices, their own research found that it killed acne-causing bacteria at around 415 nanometers, but at 420 it killed skin cells instead. “At 420, you may cause hyperpigmentation in certain skin types, but you're certainly not killing any bacteria,” Tyson says, adding that “the crappy [masks] on TikTok” can clock in at around 450-plus nanometers. Systematic studies of blue light show that bacteria is killed between 405 and 420 nanometers; while a 2021 study out of the University of Lodz observed hyperpigmentation in skin with blue light between 423 and 450 nanometers, though much of it wasn’t permanent, researchers said. If you actually want to verify an LED device’s wavelength claims you would have to purchase a spectroradiometer, which could run you upwards of $2,200 if it covers a wide enough wavelength to be effective (and would be an impressive level of consumer due diligence).

As the FDA is unlikely to create specific guidelines around LED devices any time soon, the burden falls on companies themselves to prove their worth. Some will rely on expensive clinical trials, while others will invest in equally expensive PR campaigns, leaving us—as always!—to figure out the truth for ourselves. “I’ve reached out to several different companies asking them if they're interested in doing any clinical trials or research,” says Jared Jagdeo, MD, associate professor of dermatology and director of the Center for Photomedicine at SUNY Downstate Health Sciences University. “And because of the ease of selling these devices without the need for clinical trials, [companies] oftentimes forgo investing in that and focus their energies on marketing [instead].” That said, the most valuable things to look for are, in order of importance: Third-party clinical trials of that exact device involving at least five subjects (though the more the better, says Dr. Jagdeo) that are published on a brand’s website (and ideally in a peer-reviewed journal); independent academic research on the specific wavelength employed in the device (which should be clearly listed in the product description); and firsthand reviews from people you know in real life (online customer reviews are, unfortunately, not always to be trusted). Omnilux, which has a scientific advisory board that includes Dr. Jagdeo, has been publishing its LED research in peer-reviewed journals since the company’s inception. Some brands, like Déesse, share before-and-after imagery of people who’ve used their devices consistently over weeks or months. Always look for consistent lighting and positioning in these transformation photos, because the wow factor can be misleading.

So let’s review: red light, yellow light, green light, blue light, LED, nanometers, near-infrared, far-infrared, 510 (k). You’ve got all that? Neither do we. It seems there is no clear-cut victor in the Red Light Wars. (Kind of like Star Wars in the early aughts: mired in confusion and plot chaos.). Do they work? Maaaaybe. (Just don’t slack off.) Are they safe? Probably, but depends. Are they worth the money? See questions one and two. We’ve tried our best to shine a light on the category. With all things in the beauty galaxy, there’s always a new hope, but of course a phantom menace lurks around every corner.

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