Korean Makeup and Haircare Brands Going Viral on TikTok

Scroll TikTok Shop long enough and you’ll hit a haul video of someone swatching a rom&nd tint on their wrist, or working a Mise en Scene serum through wet hair. The feed makes it look as if Korean makeup and haircare brands have taken over from skincare. Korea’s trade figures say the opposite. That gap is the clearest way to see which Korean brands on TikTok are selling, not just trending.

Quick answers

• Korea’s cosmetics exports reached a record $7.0 billion in the first half of 2026 (+27.3%), but skincare did the growing: it rose 25.0% to $5.48 billion while makeup fell 4.2% to $720 million (Korea.kr policy briefing).
• In Avenue Z’s July 2026 ranking of hair care brands on TikTok Shop, the Korean entries are medicube at No. 3 and Dr. Groot at No. 7, and both got there with scalp serums rather than shine products (Avenue Z).
• TikTok Shop, live in the US since September 12, 2023, is an on-ramp rather than a substitute for retail: Dr. Groot sells on Amazon and TikTok Shop and opened in 424 US Sephora stores on August 15, 2026 (TikTok Newsroom).

The Korean Makeup and Haircare Brands on TikTok Worth Watching in 2026

The brands with hard numbers behind them are rom&nd, Clio and its sister label Peripera on the makeup side, and medicube, Dr. Groot, Mise en Scene and Amorepacific’s scalp line Labo-H on the haircare side. That list is shorter than the one creators tag, on purpose: every name here has a sales ranking, a company disclosure or a retail rollout to point to. medicube and Dr. Groot both sit in Avenue Z’s July 2026 TikTok Shop hair care top 20, which ranks brands by the sales of their best-selling product (Avenue Z, July 2026 ranking). None of these are start-ups. Each comes from an established Korean company: iFamilySC, Clio, APR, LG H&H or Amorepacific. What changed isn’t the product, it’s the distribution. A creator video now does the introduction a store shelf used to do, and the shelf comes later.

Is K-Beauty Really Moving Beyond Skincare?

On TikTok, partly. In the export data, no. Korea’s cosmetics exports reached a provisional $7.0 billion in the first half of 2026, and skincare carried the growth at $5.48 billion, up 25.0%, while color cosmetics fell 4.2% to $720 million (Korea.kr). The US, which became Korea’s largest cosmetics market in 2025, shows the same split: skincare shipments there rose 48.6% and makeup slipped 0.7%. Skincare is also the most crowded shelf, with snail-mucin serums and cica creams common across brands and a dense vocabulary of skin-type words on the labels. That crowding explains the creator attention on makeup and haircare. A tint swatch or a before-and-after hair clip stands out on a short-form feed in a way the tenth near-identical serum can’t. Attention, though, is not volume.

Which Makeup Products Are Actually Trending?

Lip products lead, and rom&nd is the clearest case. The brand joined US TikTok Shop in April 2025, and DB Securities analyst Heo Je-na estimated its sales there at ₩800 million in July and over ₩1 billion in August that year (Asia Economy). Its parent iFamilySC said a lip oil launched in the second quarter of 2026 had already shipped more than 1 million units, with Japan and the US among its markets (Etoday). Clio grows through a different channel. Its North American revenue rose 58% to ₩9.1 billion in the second quarter of 2026, and the company credited Amazon sales of eye makeup, mascara in particular, rather than TikTok (Etoday). In July 2026, Clio, Peripera and the group’s skincare line Goodal went into 80 Nordstrom stores. Company by company, Korean makeup is growing in the US. As a category it is flat, with US-bound makeup exports down 0.7% in the first half of 2026.

What Hair Care Brands Are Trending on TikTok in the US in 2026?

The Korean hair care brands with sales-chart proof on TikTok Shop in 2026 are medicube and Dr. Groot. Avenue Z’s July 2026 top 20 lists medicube under its US store at No. 3 with the Deoxyribose Scalp Serum ($22 to $66), and Dr. Groot at No. 7 with its Scalp Revitalizing roll-on serum ($26 to $72) (Avenue Z). Both are scalp treatments. That is the pattern hiding behind the “glass hair” trend: the ultra-smooth, high-shine look fills tutorials, but the Korean hair products that convert on TikTok Shop work on the scalp. Amorepacific is playing both sides of that split. It said in June 2026 that its scalp-care brand Labo-H would launch on US TikTok Shop that month, and that Mise en Scene, already selling on Amazon and TikTok Shop, grew sales 237% in Amazon’s Big Spring Sale, where its Perfect Serum ranked first among hair styling oils (Etoday). Amorepacific’s own first-quarter report adds that Mise en Scene uses TikTok Shop to open new markets (Amorepacific Group). The gap between the two lists is the real story. Creators tag one set of brands for shine, and the sales chart rewards a different set for scalp care.

How Big a Role Does TikTok Shop Play?

TikTok Shop is the on-ramp, not the destination. TikTok launched the shop in the US on September 12, 2023, with shoppable videos, LIVE shopping, a Shop tab and an affiliate program that pays creators commission (TikTok Newsroom). For a Korean brand, that combination turns a creator into a sales channel before any retailer signs on. Dr. Groot shows the full arc. It sells on Amazon and TikTok Shop, where its Amazon sales rose 153% in the first half of 2026, and LG H&H has since added about 600 Costco stores across North America and, from August 15, 2026, 424 US Sephora stores carrying 14 products (Ezyeconomy). iFamilySC said in August 2026 that rom&nd would enter about 600 stores of a large US retail chain by the end of that month. The market underneath is growing fast: the US took $1.45 billion of Korean cosmetics in the first half of 2026, up 41.5% and 20.7% of all exports, and most of that money still buys skincare (Korea.kr). Korean food brands run on a similar funnel, where a viral video sells the first packet and a milder product sells the repeat, as the split between Buldak’s original and carbonara flavors shows.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Where can I buy rom&nd, Clio or Peripera in the US besides TikTok Shop?

Clio, Peripera and Goodal went into 80 Nordstrom stores in July 2026, and Clio’s eye makeup sells mainly through Amazon, according to the company’s second-quarter results. rom&nd’s parent said the brand would reach about 600 stores of a large US retail chain by the end of August 2026.

Q: Are the brands in glass hair videos the same ones that sell best on TikTok Shop?

Not usually. Glass-hair tutorials sell shine, but the Korean hair products in TikTok Shop’s July 2026 top 20 are two scalp serums: medicube’s Deoxyribose Scalp Serum at No. 3 and Dr. Groot’s roll-on serum at No. 7. Mise en Scene’s Perfect Serum, a styling oil, has its sales record on Amazon instead.

Q: Is Korean haircare different from Korean skincare marketing?

Yes. Korean haircare sells the scalp as a separate step, with its own serums and even its own brands, such as Amorepacific’s Labo-H, while skincare marketing tends to bundle everything into one routine narrative.

Q: Why is TikTok Shop important for Korean beauty brands specifically?

It turns creators into a sales channel before a retailer is involved. rom&nd reached an estimated ₩1 billion a month on US TikTok Shop by August 2025, four months after joining, and Dr. Groot went from Amazon and TikTok Shop to 424 Sephora stores in August 2026.

Q: Which Korean beauty products go viral on TikTok?

The ones with sales data behind the buzz in 2026 are medicube’s Deoxyribose Scalp Serum and Dr. Groot’s scalp roll-on serum on TikTok Shop, rom&nd’s tints and its new lip oil (over 1 million units shipped), and Mise en Scene’s Perfect Serum, which topped Amazon’s hair styling oils in the Big Spring Sale.

Q: What are the K-beauty trends on TikTok in 2026?

Three stand out in 2026: lip-tint and lip-oil swatch videos, scalp and hair-thickening serums riding the glass-hair wave, and a TikTok-first route into US retail that lets Korean brands reach buyers who’d never walk into an Olive Young.

Skincare is still the engine of K-beauty’s growth, and the first half of 2026 made that plain. What TikTok changed is how the makeup and haircare brands around it get found, and which of them can turn a viral clip into shelf space at Sephora or Nordstrom.