Mixing vanilla into the cookie batter with your mom, laughing with your high school friends before a Saturday night out, walking along a beach as the weather turns crisp—a scent can bring back, viscerally, all the feelings that were wrapped up in life moments, big and small. Unlike our other senses, smell has a direct line to our brain’s emotion and memory centers.
Perfume is a powerful thing, as close to time travel as it gets. In fact, memories and scents are so interconnected that it’s widely believed there’s no such thing as a universally appealing smell. And whether or not you like a perfume goes far beyond its composition and sillage—it’s tangled up in your personal associations with its notes.
So we can only hope that you’ll find something to love in this year’s Allure Best of Beauty Scent winners , whether it’s salty sea air, crisp green tea, clean laundry , or cassette tapes that bring you a nostalgic kind of joy. When you find a perfume that’s you, it becomes a part of your story.
It gets mixed in with your memories—and one day, a whiff of the familiar will remind someone of you.
Scroll to discover our 19 Allure Best of Beauty Scent winners.
Shop your favorite category or keep scrolling for the year's favorite fragrances, body mists, and candles.
Former Best of Beauty editorial assistant Edward Horgan applies the D.S. & Durga Debaser In Bloom.
Why It Won: Record stores, mixtapes, ’80s rock and roll. D.S. & Durga Debaser In Bloom is an homage to pre-Spotify music culture with notes of plasticky-sweet cassette tape mellowed out by cream and coconut husk, mingling with gardenia. It’s a quirky-cool take on florals that’s sweetly warm and as thoughtfully curated as compilation tapes of yore.
Tester feedback from commerce market editor Sarah Hoffmann
"In terms of new fragrance launches, I tend to tune out the flanker noise, but when it's D.S. & Durga reimagining a scent, I'm listening. The original Debaser is one of my all-time favorites, and the addition of a couple of white floral notes and a touch of cream is a welcome, springtime update." —Sarah Hoffmann, commerce market editor
Why It Won: If you sipped a green tea overlooking a beautifully manicured vista in the morning, the scent from the cup mingling with a faint hint of grass, flowers, and trees might smell like Aesop Virēre Eau de Parfum . This delicate fragrance puts the focus on green tea notes, made more interesting with bright bergamot, sweet fig, and woody cedar for a fresh, restorative vibe, like an afternoon in a pristine, sunlit garden.
Tester feedback from senior news editor James Manso
"I love a citrus fragrance, but I struggle with how similar most of them smell. I've come to take it as code for 'We put a lot of bergamot in this.' Aesop.
Virēre is denser, mossier, a touch sweeter, and all-around defying what I've come to expect from this olfactive family. It also dries down beautifully as the day goes on, showcasing the earthiness of the green tea note." —James Manso, senior news editor
Commerce market editor Sarah Hoffmann spritzes on Lore Somewhere But Nowhere Eau de Parfum .
Why It Won: It’s rich and enveloping, like sinking into a soft leather reading chair: Lore Somewhere But Nowhere Eau de Parfum ’s cedarwood is smoothed by vanilla cream and black tea, spiced with cardamom and carrot seeds, and made extra luxe with worn-in leather.
Tester feedback from senior staff writer Elizabeth Gulino
"My first thought when I sprayed Lore’s Somewhere But Nowhere on my skin was that it was masculine—and it is!—and that it should be worn beside a crackling outdoor fireplace, but don’t let that deter you from spritzing it on as soon as possible. I prefer to wear woody, spicy scents when I go out for dinner, drinks, or both, and this one fits right into my nighttime fragrance wardrobe." —Elizabeth Gulino, senior staff writer
Why It Won: Salty sea foam and mineralic wet rocks mingling with crisp eucalyptus and sweet flowers (jasmine, water lily, rose)—the unlikely blend in Heretic Black Salt makes for a bright take on earthy fragrances that’s as lighthearted as skipping stones by the seashore.
Tester feedback from former Best of Beauty editorial assistant Edward Horgan
"This is an earthy fragrance for the true earthy girls, so steer clear if you’re looking for a light, breezy, plant smell. A spritz of Heretic Black Salt leaves me feeling like I’ve just stepped out of my favorite Icelandic spa onto a black sand beach." —Edward Horgan, former Best of Beauty editorial assistant
Social media manager Bianc Richards mists on the Octavia Morgan Los Angeles Vanillin Supreme Eau de Parfum.
Why It Won: It’s as creamy and nostalgic as a soda float, with hints of warm rum and sandalwood that make this gourmand seem all grown-up. Octavia Morgan Los Angeles Vanillin Supreme Eau de Parfum is a refined take on vanilla that’s surprisingly subdued, but still elicits all the happiness that the spice, with its associations of baking and dessert, evokes, but more panna cotta than cupcake.
Tester feedback from social media manager Bianca Richards
"While gourmands often lean overtly sweet, Octavia Morgan's Vanillin Supreme stood out for its refined interpretation of vanilla. The addition of rum and orange notes gives the fragrance a warm, citrusy depth that expands my understanding of what a vanilla-forward scent can be.
Plus, it's incredibly sensual. For me, it took some getting used to at first, but there's so much beauty throughout the scent journey over the course of the day because it sends out those soft vanilla/jasmine notes, but the wear appears more rich and warm on the skin over time, which gives it that sensual feel." —Bianca Richards, social media manager
Content director Sophia Panych spritzes on the Tom Ford Beauty Taormina Orange Eau de Parfum .
Why It Won: Inspired by a stroll through orange groves, sun-warmed skin (musk notes) mix with bittersweet citrus (bright mandarin, juicy blood orange, tart lime) in Tom Ford Beauty Taormina Orange Eau de Parfum. There’s a hint of fresh, green notes, too, which keeps the effervescence of the citrus grounded, for a sophisticated and nuanced take on classic citrus perfume.
Tester feedback from content director Sophia Panych
"Tom Ford Taormina Orange Eau de Parfum is an unapologetically citrus fragrance. It leans into the brightest, most tart ingredients like blood orange, lime, green mandarin, and bitter orange bigarade oil, and doesn’t try to soften the sharpness of those notes.
What the woody-mossy base does is add depth, making it more interesting, complex, and longer-lasting than many options in this category. Throughout this summer’s heatwaves, it’s the fragrance I've been gravitating toward because a few spritzes leave me feeling fresh, pretty, and mentally on a beach in Sicily versus my sweaty Underground commute." —Sophia Panych, content director
Beauty director Sarah Kinonen mists on the Miu Miu Beauty Fleur de Lait .
Why It Won: You won’t get a single trace of apple or berries or any of the usual fruity notes that, let’s face it, can make some perfumes smell a whole lot like shampoo. Miu Miu Beauty Fleur de Lait is a much more grown-up and completely unexpected take on fruity fragrance, blending tropical mango with creamy coconut and floral Osmanthus for a scent that’s bright, fresh, and just a little bit sweet.
Tester feedback from beauty director Sarah Kinonen
"A fruity fragrance, but make it modern! This Miu Miu perfume may not be your run-of-the-mill tropical scent, but that’s what makes it so interesting.
It’s less on the nose and more warm and cozy with notes of mango and coconut, then settles down to something more milky and skin-like. I wore it to the office the other day, and someone said I smelled like clean laundry.
This fragrance has range!" —Sarah Kinonen, beauty director
Why It Won: Skin, warmed by sun—that’s the idea behind solar fragrances in general, but DedCool Mineral Milk puts its own twist on the category, and we smell so much sexier for it. There’s a mix of creamy, floral, and aquatic notes in here—musk, amber milk, lavender, sea salt—that’s richer than the usual more citrusy solar.
This is a perfume that’s less bright and sunny, more deep and oceanic—like skin glowing in a beachy sunset.
"Another day, another DedCool scent I'm obsessed with. This new one is sweet, but not overly so, with a warm dry-down, thanks to notes of nectar, lavender, and amber milk. An instant fave!" —Sarah Kinonen, beauty director
Beauty director Sarah Kinonen spritzes on By/Rosie Jane Rosie .
Why It Won: Remember when musks were heavy and…musky? The new iterations are the opposite: clean yet warm, and inspired by naked skin.
By/Rosie Jane Rosie is an especially delicate skin scent—a mix of white musks warmed by romantic rose that’s as carefree, cozy, and effortless as sleeping naked in really, really expensive sheets. It’s easy to see why Rosie got us into skin scents when it launched this one 10 years ago—and why it’s remained an all-time favorite clean musk ever since.
"'Oh my gosh, you smell so good' is music to my ears—and a phrase I hear approximately 28,468 times a day when I wear By/Rosie Jane Rosie. Am I exaggerating?
Perhaps, but I really do get a bounty of compliments every time I wear this perfume. The skin-like scent has soft notes of rose oil, but doesn’t smell like a floral.
Instead, thanks to white musk and warm amber, it smells like…me. And you.
Which is probably why people love it so much. It’s airy, fresh, and, if you’re a layerer like I am, amps up whatever fragrance you’re wearing with it.
I tend to pair it with another signature scent of mine: The Harmonist Sacred Water." —Sarah Kinonen, beauty director
Why It Won: Woody spices, with an undercurrent of black pepper, make YSL Beauty Babycat Reno smell as mysterious as the blend sounds. The piquant notes are tempered by creamy vanilla for a modern, more mellow take on spicy fragrance that’s the olfactory version of understated sexy.
Tester feedback from director of programming & development Logan Tsugita
"YSL Beauty Babycat Reno surprised me at first. It's very bold, and after my first test spritz, I kept going back to the bottle for little whiffs throughout the day. That intoxicating It factor has made it one of my favorite fragrances for a night out. The balance of vanilla and spice with a woody base dries down nicely on the skin and lasts all day." —Logan Tsugita, director, programming & development
Why It Won: “There is an idea of a Patrick Bateman.” And it is the most unlikely muse we could have imagined for a perfume—or for anything in beauty, really. But the seedy, money-fueled world of Bret Easton Ellis’s American Psycho , with all its excess and vanity, its deception and greed, did inspire a pretty killer fragrance.
At first, it seems fresh with a salty aqua accord, but as it opens, there’s something darker underneath—a spicy, almost syrupy wood that’s as opulent as ’80s Wall Street. The juxtaposition makes for a perfume that’s decadent and slightly mysterious ( not in the sociopathic Bateman way).
"Although the name is what drew me into this fragrance initially, the scent had me hooked—and it's now become a staple in my fragrance collection. A couple of spritzes of 19-69 American Psycho covers me in an airy, herbaceous veil with a slight marine breeze, thanks to the aqua accord." —Edward Horgan, former Best of Beauty editorial assistant
Senior beauty editor Jesa Marie Calaor applies the Noyz Rinse Cycle.
Why It Won: All the sexiness of a skin scent, with its clean, slightly warm musk flower, livened up with a touch of sweetness from sparkling lemon, guava, and pear, makes Noyz Rinse Cycle a bright and cheery take on one of perfumery’s biggest trends. The creamy stick feels smooth going over pulse points (wrists, the sides of the neck), and the cute, chunky off-white tube can be stashed in a purse or makeup bag without taking up much room.
It’s got a magnetic closure so it won’t open randomly in your bag. Perfect for travel, on-the-go touch-ups, or days when you’d rather not be in a cloud of fragrance.
Tester feedback from senior beauty editor Jesa Marie Calaor
"Rinse Cycle is one of my favorite scents from Noyz. The solid perfume glides on a trail of clean-smelling musk with a hint of brightness, thanks to top notes of guava and lemon. It evokes the feeling of smushing your face into freshly laundered linens, and layers seamlessly under any EDP you might decide to combine it with." —Jesa Marie Calaor, senior beauty editor
Social media manager Bianca Richards mists on the Phlur Peach Skin Hair and Body Fragrance Mist .
Why It Won: Refreshing and light, Phlur Peach Skin Hair and Body Fragrance Mist ’s mix of peach, plum, and Bellini is breezy and sparkling. It's delicate enough to spray on from head to toe, with a hint of creamy coconut caramel and sheer amber that keep the blend fresher and more fun than fruit salad.
"My love for fruity perfume has been reignited this year, but one scent that I've been gatekeeping since it launched is Phlur's Peach Skin Hair and Body Fragrance Mist. Body mists have been a staple in my routine since I was young, and Phlur's lineup is one of the best for its impressive staying power.
Peach Skin offers the perfect balance of juicy sweetness and soft sandalwood, creating the most beautiful skin-like scent in my body mist collection. I spray at least 10 spritzes every time I wear it, and somehow I'm still nowhere near running out." —Bianca Richards, social media manager
Why It Won: This concentrated perfume oil is spicy and green and earthy, and somehow it all just works—and it works beautifully. Homecourt Cece Perfume Oil features comforting cinnamon warmed by cardamom, and the pantry staples are grounded with vetiver and patchouli, so the overall effect is sophisticated and intriguing.
It doesn’t fall neatly into any one box—it’s not a gourmand, not a pure patchouli—it’s something else entirely, and that makes this unique fragrance the stuff that signature scents are made of. The rollerball format is a convenient plus that’s easy to travel with, but the oil inside lasts so long on skin and unfolds so beautifully, you probably won’t need to touch up.
Tester feedback from commerce editor Madison San Miguel
"Some perfume oil rollers can leak as you apply them, but not this one. The packaging is super-luxe, the rollerball glides so smoothly, and the scent is intense in a good way for the format." —Madison San Miguel, commerce editor
Why It Won: Darker and more intoxicating than the average floral bouquet, velvety Damascus rose and smoky oud make Cereria Mollá 1899 Bulgarian Rose & Oud a completely unexpected and complex floral: It’s rich, it’s powdery, and it makes any room smell insanely expensive. If the usual flowery candle evokes a field of lilacs, this one is more reminiscent of Great Gatsby opulence or, you know, some place really mysterious and fancy, like the mansion in Clue… The handmade glass vase, in black with simple white letters, looks fashionable in the study, the billiard room, or wherever you place it.
"Two years ago, I would've told you I had never met a candle I didn't love. But as the realities of my olfactive preferences (and apartment storage) have set in, I've become much more discerning, and also shameless about re-gifting ones that don't tick every box.
Cereria Mollá 1899 Bulgarian Rose & Oud has earned its place in my little slice of Manhattan: the wick burns clean, the wax melts evenly, and perhaps most importantly, the smell is heavenly and seasonless: just enough depth for snowy winter nights but freshly floral enough to complement my air conditioning in August." —James Manso, senior news editor
Senior shopping director Shanna Shipin lights the Voluspa California Summers candle.
Why It Won: If someone was baking a coconut cake and their kitchen opened up onto a gorgeous Malibu beach, with a soft breeze coming off the ocean, we imagine their home would smell like Voluspa California Summers . This is one dreamy, beachy candle with cozy vanilla, smooth coconut, and soft teakwood. It creates a nostalgic (vanilla) and summery (coconut) vibe that makes any room that much more inviting.
Tester feedback from senior shopping director Shanna Shipin
"Because I'm from California, I can confidently say that this candle smells like home—the most idyllic version of it. Voluspa California Summers candle is summer solstice at the beach lying across a sun-warmed towel while a fresh breeze washes over you.
Despite the name, it’s not a fragrance you only want to smell at a certain time of year. It’s fresh but warm, and a candle that’ll be burning year-round for me.
On top of the bright-but-cozy scent, the lovely, large jar looks extra beautiful in front of a window when the sunshine hits it." —Shanna Shipin, senior shopping director
Why It Won: The simple blue bottle has a coastal-chic vibe, but it's the scent inside that’s really breezy. Capri Blue Volcano Signature Reed Diffuser is bright and citrusy, reminiscent of fresh grapefruit and oranges—a sparkling home fragrance that’s uplifting and fresh.
"In my mind, Capri Blue’s bright and fresh Volcano fragrance has top notes of sugary citrus (orange and lemon), a heart of the kitchenware section at Rockefeller Center’s Anthropologie location, and a dry-down of skinny jeans and peplum tops. It’s nostalgic: a little bit hipster and forever rooted in 2013.
And every time I light the candle or set up this diffuser in my very-2026 apartment, I’m drawn right back into that era. I almost miss it!” —Sarah Kinonen, beauty director
Beauty director Sarah Kinonen mists her bed with DedCool Room + Linen Spray Xtra Milk .
Why It Won: If you’d like people to walk into your home and say, “It smells so good in here!” And not, “Oh,… did you get a dog?” then consider DedCool Room + Linen Spray Xtra Milk a staple. The mist fills rooms with the soft, clean scent of fresh laundry and sparkling countertops.
The subtle blend of musk , amber, and bergamot doesn’t make a room, or your couch, or guest sheets smell like you sprayed them with air freshener; it just smells super clean.
"I don't know how many times (or how many people) I've shared my love for DedCool's Xtra Milk scent, but here we are again. I don't mind, though!
I'll shout it from the rooftops for all I care, it's that good. The creamy, musky scent (with notes of bergamot, white musk, and amber) is one of those skin-like fragrances that smells a little different on everyone—in the best way.
And now, my sheets smell like it too, thanks to DedCool's room and linen spray. It's the same familiar scent being sprayed all over my house in a bigger bottle.
I only need a spritz or two atop sheets to give them an instant refresh, or three or four misted into my living room rug for a midday mood boost. It's light, doesn't leave any residue, and pleasantly smells like me...and my husband, my dog, and my cat." —Sarah Kinonen, beauty director
Why It Won: Completely indulgent and worth every cent, LAFCO New York Chamomile Lavender Laundry Detergent turns the routine chore of laundry into full-on self-care. Plant-based cleansers (potassium cocoate and lauryl glucoside) are gentle on your clothes and linens, but the real star here is the fragrance.
Crisp sage with chamomile and lavender, two of the world’s most relaxing scents, make for a calming, fresh fragrance that we want to surround ourselves with at all times—and we can, after a few loads with this heavenly laundry detergent.
Tester feedback from former Best of Beauty editorial assistant
"Nothing feels better than when I come home from a long day at work and crash onto my fresh-smelling bed, thanks to this laundry detergent. The scent is heavenly without overpowering the room and makes it that much more exciting to hit the hay at the end of the night." —Edward Horgan, former Best of Beauty editorial assistant
How does Allure test perfumes and fragrances for Best of Beauty? We test fragrances in various environments to evaluate how a scent wears over time. Editors look at longevity, sillage (how far a scent travels), complexity of the notes, and how the fragrance evolves throughout the day. We also consider mood, versatility, and uniqueness in the final selection.
Yes, many of the winning scents are eau de parfums or concentrated oils designed to last throughout the day. We prioritize fragrances that maintain their signature scent without fading or turning, even after hours of wear on warm or dry skin.
Several winning fragrances are marketed as clean, hypoallergenic, or free from common irritants like phthalates or synthetic dyes. We note when a formula is designed to be non-irritating or more skin-sensitive, and our testers include those with fragrance allergies and sensitivities.
This category includes floral, woody, spicy, musky, citrus, and gourmand scents, in formats ranging from eau de parfums to body mists to oils to solids. You'll find fresh daytime picks, special-occasion fragrances, unisex options, and niche blends that offer something for every personal style.
Each product description includes the key notes, scent family, and wear profile to help you decide. If you're unsure, look for terms that match your preferences (like "warm and spicy" or "light and fresh"). Many of the winners also come in discovery sets or travel sizes for easier testing.
Discover more 2026 Best of Beauty Winners: