ETUDE SoonJung pH 5.5 Relief Toner

What is this product?

에뛰드 순정 약산성 5.5 진정 토너 is a Korean hydrating toner sold in 350ml and 500ml bottles plus a 200ml refill under one statutory notice, manufactured by 코스비전 for 에뛰드 in Korea. Its printed Korean 전성분 is unusually short at 15 comma separated tokens, and six of the first seven are humectants: 프로판디올, 글리세린, 베타인 and 판테놀 at positions 2 through 5, then 1,2-헥산디올 and 폴리글리세린-3. The soothing pair the brand trademarks as 판텐소사이드 is 판테놀 fifth and 마데카소사이드 eleventh. 황금추출물, 토코페롤 and 녹차추출물 close the list. There is no oil, no fatty ester, no exfoliating acid, no ethanol, no silicone, no colourant and no declared fragrance anywhere on the label, and the brand's ten ingredient exclusion claim was verified item by item against the printed list. The statutory notice records 기능성 as 해당사항없음, so this is not a notified functional cosmetic. No ingredient level and no measured pH is published; the 5.5 in the name appears only as marketing copy. The brand cites five in house tests from 2016 and 2017, one of which names an institution. The label cannot account for the trademarked cooling claim, since no cooling agent appears among the 15 tokens, and the brand's own instruction is to refrigerate the bottle. Consumer topic labels cluster on tolerance, calm and acidity. Best for sensitive or dehydrated oily skin wanting a plain fragrance free hydrating step; not a fit for anyone wanting exfoliation or a moisturiser that stands alone.

What makes it different?

Three things set it apart on a crowded soothing toner shelf. First, the list is short in a category where length is usually the selling point. Fifteen tokens against the twenty to seventy that neighbouring products print means every entry is legible and there is no botanical tail to hide behind, and the four classes that most often cause trouble in a leave on product are all absent by verified count rather than by claim. Second, the entire formula is water plus humectants plus two soothing actives, with no lipid phase at all, which makes it a genuinely single purpose product: it hydrates and calms and does not pretend to moisturise, exfoliate or treat pores. Third, the marketing carries two figures the label cannot support, a 98.3 percent moisture content with no stated definition and a trademarked cooling system with no cooling agent among the 15 tokens, and the brand's own statutory 사용방법 row supplies the real mechanism by telling the user to refrigerate the bottle. The large 350ml and 500ml formats with a refill option, together with the printed cotton pad and dry sheet routes, mark it as designed for high volume use rather than for drop by drop application.

What is in it?

The full ingredient list as the brand publishes it, in the printed order. Each name links to what we know about that ingredient.

This brand publishes its ingredient list in Korean only. Names below are the matching INCI names from the Korean Cosmetic Association ingredient dictionary, except 1 with no dictionary entry, left in Korean.

Key ingredient

• Water
• 프로판디올
• Glycerin
• Betaine
• Panthenol
• 1,2-Hexanediol
• Polyglycerin-3
• Ethylhexylglycerin
• Disodium EDTA
• Carbomer
• Madecassoside
• Butylene Glycol
• Scutellaria Baicalensis Root Extract
• Tocopherol
• Camellia Sinensis Leaf Extract

Ingredients with no mark are ones we found nothing notable about, and when marks overlap on one ingredient we show the caution first.

Did the ad claims hold up?

We checked 7 lines this product advertises against the ingredient list and public documents. One of them looks likely, though none are proven outright.

Each line is quoted as the brand published it, and each one was read on its own against the ingredient list and the documents the brand publishes.

How we read these lines

What else is worth seeing?

Products we read alongside this one.

• ETUDE SoonJung 10-Free Moisture EmulsionAnother product in the same category