Appliance giant Shark is known for one main thing: suction. Its vacuums consistently rank among the top-tier devices that can remove dirt and gunk from the grossest floors and the highest pile rugs. So, one would assume that the same company would be able to create a device that can do the same gunk removal on your face, right?

That was my initial thought when I tested out the new Shark FacialPro Glow, which came out in early October. The device sells itself as an all-in-one, at-home hydrafacial device with some cryotherapy mixed in. SharkNinja, the maker of Shark FacialPro Glow, claims it can improve the overall look of your skin, tighten pores, and boost hydration and circulation.

In my head, I had images of running the device across my face as it suctioned all the grime out of my pores and left me feeling fresh like a professionally cleaned home.

---

Honestly, the end result—both in feels and vibes and also the look and glow of my skin—was not that far off. But before you go out and purchase a $400 FacialPro Glow, it’s worth understanding how it works and what we actually know about what it is doing to your skin.

Why does it look like it belongs in the ocean or a fish tank?

If you’ve ever gone scuba diving, or even snorkeling, you remember all the odd pieces of equipment you need. The FacialPro Glow is kind of like that—just as many parts; and all of them are important. So, it’s worth first naming them and what they are meant to do.

Power Hub: This connects and powers both attachments. It charges via a USB-C cable that’s provided. The charging actually takes quite a while—4 hours to get it to full charge. And that only lasts for about the length of one facial session, give or take. So you’ll need to recharge the device every time you use it, essentially.

Depuffi Attachment: First of two attachments. Its two modes deliver hot and cold temperature to the skin from a smooth metal upper component that is meant to glide across your face.

Exfoliation Attachment: Second of two attachments. Contains a powered suction-like device similar to a pore vacuum that pulls oil, blackheads, dead skin, and debris from pores and can infuse water and other substances into the skin.

See Shark FacialPro Glow at Amazon

Derm Detox AHA + BHA Exfoliating Gel: A clear, colorless gel. It contains glycolic acid, a type of alpha hydroxy acid (AHA), which helps exfoliate rough skin, retain moisture, and improve cell turnover. It also contains salicylic acid, which breaks up clogged pores and provides an overall anti-inflammatory effect.

Hydro Infuse BHA Hydrator: A liquid that gets placed into the exfoliation tank. It mainly contains niacinamide, which strengthens the skin barrier and improves its overall texture. It also contains salicylic acid and a variety of other antioxidants.

2x Normal Tips + 2 Gentle Tips: Attaches to the exfoliation attachment. Each version—gentle and normal—comes in two sizes: one size for the T-zone and one for your cheeks and the rest of your face.

Case: The products all come with a case included. It doesn’t stay together super well, even with the help of an included strap that fits, albeit loosely, around it. Shark does sell a separate travel case that has a wraparound zipper, but it costs $28.

A science experiment in your bathroom

First, a little bit about my skin. Currently, my skin—and skincare routine—is as basic as it gets. I’ve had periods of time, especially in my 20s, where I was more acne-prone and have used everything under the sun to try to fix it. However, in the past couple of years, my skin has calmed down quite a bit. I wash my face twice a day, moisturize with a pretty basic moisturizer, and call it a day. If anything, I would call my skin a bit sensitive in that it blushes easily, or if I gently scratch or rub it, it will turn red.

Given my extremely minimal skin care routine prior to this, I was a bit overwhelmed by all the attachments and gels for the FacialPro Glow. Using it is a multistep process and each step takes a few minutes so the whole thing takes up at least 15 minutes of your time, especially when you have to remember the steps and which order they go in. It’s a lot. I now understand why people pay to get facials and have someone else take care of everything.

The first step is to “prime” your skin by attaching the DePuffi attachment to the Powerhub and using the heat component. This part ultimately became my favorite step. You are basically massaging your face with a heated smooth metal device. It’s incredibly calming and indulging. I wanted to just carry it around in my pocket with me and use it whenever I felt a pang of stress coming on. What this is designed to do, though, is to allow heat to open up your pores so that the other products that remove dead skin and gunk from your face work better.

The next step is to apply the Detox Gel and leave it on for three minutes. If you’ve never used these products before (that was me), this is going to feel a little tingly; apparently that is normal with any AHA products and you shouldn’t panic. What this is actually doing is chemically dissolving dead cells on the surface of your skin—fun!

After you’ve waited three minutes, you wash the gel off your skin with warm water and attach the exfoliation attachment to the Powerhub. Add water to the fill tank and your desired tip (gentle or regular; I always went with gentle, but again, my skin is sensitive and fragile so listen to your skin). Once you turn the exfoliated attachment on, you’ll see it has three levels of intensity. Choose whichever you prefer, but to me even the lowest level was pretty intense. Place it gently over your skin and turn it on, and you’ll quickly feel like an octopus has just attached itself to your skin and is gliding along while simultaneously attempting to suction pieces of your epidermis off. And this is all while the motor is running loudly enough that you feel like you are at a car wash. You do get used to this after a while, but it’s odd, to say the least.

Once you’ve done this for three minutes, it’s time for the part that I highly anticipated: the gunk check! The exfoliator hub has two tanks, the clean tank and the gunk tank (labeled literally as such). After suctioning off all your dead skin cells, you can and should open up the gunk tank and see them for yourself. My gunk tank usually looked fairly white and cloudy, and after some research, including this dermatologist’s review of the FacialPro Glow, I found that this was likely not all my dead skin cells floating, but perhaps mostly the rest of the Detox Gel that didn’t rinse off initially—and maybe some dead skin cells mixed in.

The next step is to fill the clean tank with the Hydro Infuse BHA Hydrator and then use the exfoliator again, same as before, but now with the infused stuff. The idea is that the octopus suction technology actually infuses the ingredients into the skin better than if you were to just apply it alone. That’s the idea anyway. The actual science on this is a bit unclear. There are no studies that show infusing the product into the skin via the suction technology is actually any better than just massaging it gently into your face with your hands.

The suction device acts almost like a less aggressive pore vacuum, which has a lot of mixed reviews from dermatologists and other skin experts. Many dermatologists actually recommend that you stay away from these types of products because they can be pretty aggressive and don’t necessarily have any added benefit for the skin (again there’s a lack of research on this topic in general, so it’s hard to say). Worst case scenario is that you have very sensitive, delicate skin and they cause little broken blood vessels (this never happened to me), which promotes redness and can make skin conditions like rosacea flare up.

Oddly enough, though, my skin felt SO, SO good after I finished with the exfoliator. It felt plump and full of life. I felt like I was glowing inside and out. Several Gizmodo editors and reporters also said my skin did look very glowing, so it wasn’t all just in my head.

The last step is to reattach the DePuffi and use the “Cool” setting for a few minutes. The cold temperatures are meant to close pores (now that they are clean and glowy) and prevent dirt from getting in and also to reduce any fluid retention. You can use this setting for up to four minutes, according to the instructions, but honestly I think I would have felt pretty similar if I had just splashed some cold water on my face. Unlike the “Heat” mode of the DePuffi, “Cool” was not fun.

Does my skin secretly love suction?

My skin looked absolutely stunning, to be honest. It was soft and plump in a way that I only get if I’m on vacation on a precisely humidified tropical island. So I can’t lie that my skin looked and felt far better than it did before I used Shark’s FacialPro Glow. But it’s hard to tell what actually made my face so healthy and glowy.

SharkNinja’s claim is that the chemical formulas in the Detox and Hydro Infuse combine with the exfoliator technology to create a synergistic effect (their combined efforts are greater than the sum of their parts). This would make sense if there was research to back it up, but right now there just isn’t outside of a small clinical trial that involved 60 subjects and was run by SharkNinja itself. On top of that, the two products—the Derm Detox and the Hydro Infuse—do contain ingredients that are proven (through numerous studies) to help improve the look and feel of skin. For $400, I would want to know for sure that it wasn’t those products alone that were making my skin look and feel good. And if you were to continue using this on a regular basis, the Detox Gel and Hydro Infuser will eventually run out. Shark doesn’t say how long they last, but I’d imagine at least a couple of months. It’s unclear if other, similar products would work as well, either. You can buy replacements—$49 for the two together—on the Shark site.

The interesting thing about the FacialPro Glow is that there really isn’t anything similar to it on the market, so it’s hard to compare it to anything else. If this experiment has taught me anything, it’s that I should try out other skincare products, at least a little bit. But whether I need to use heat and cold and suction in addition to that is unclear. And at $400 (plus the ongoing need to replace the Gel and Infuser), it would be a hard sell. But if you’ve tried it all, and you are still seeking that extra boost to give you healthy glowy skin, the FacialPro Glow + DePuffi is an incredibly good time.

See Shark FacialPro Glow at Amazon