I spotted this advent calendar the other day and honestly, it looks amazing.
There’s two options as well, the Signature Edition and the Special Edition. Same price, different line-ups.
At a glance
The Cult Beauty advent calendar comes in two editions, both £245, both valued by Cult Beauty at over £1,100. The Special Edition has 38 products, 17 full size, across skincare, makeup, hair and fragrance. The Signature Edition has 33 products, 19 full size, across skincare, makeup and hair, with no fragrance in it. 29 products appear in both. Both are in stock now and usually go out within 24 hours. You can buy the Cult Beauty advent calendar here.
So here’s the whole thing, laid out properly, including the shipping detail that’s easy to miss and what separates the two editions. If you just want the list, it’s a bit further down and you can scroll straight to it, I won’t be offended.
What Cult Beauty have confirmed
Straight off Cult Beauty’s own product page:
- Price: £245, and the Signature Edition is the same
- Special Edition contents: 38 products, 17 full size, 18 travel size, 3 deluxe size, across skincare, makeup, hair and fragrance
- Signature Edition contents: 33 products, 19 full size, 12 travel size, 2 deluxe size, across skincare, makeup and hair
- Overlap: 29 products are in both boxes
- Value: Cult Beauty put it at over £1,100
- Availability: in stock, usually dispatched within 24 hours
- Payments: four interest free payments of £61.25 with Clearpay
- Delivery: not available to the US, Canada or Argentina, and further shipping restrictions apply
- Points: 245 Cult Status points, on double points at the moment
Where the Cult Beauty advent calendar ships to
This one sits further down the product page, so I’m putting it up here.
The Cult Beauty advent calendar can’t be shipped to the US, Canada or Argentina, and Cult Beauty say additional shipping restrictions apply on top of that. A big chunk of the people who read this blog are in the States, and I’d rather tell you now than have you get all the way to checkout and find out there. My Sephora advent calendar post is the UK one and won’t help you either, it’s UK mainland only. Sephora US run their own version with different contents, and you can shop the Sephora US advent calendar here.
What’s inside the Cult Beauty advent calendar Special Edition
Right. All 38, grouped the way Cult Beauty group them, by size rather than door order, because door order tells you nothing useful when you’re deciding whether to buy.
Full sizes (17)
- Westman Atelier Eye Want You Mascara in Black, 8.5ml
- LANEIGE Cream Skin Cerapeptide Mist, 30ml
- MAKE UP FOR EVER Artist Color Crayon in 606 Wherever Walnut, 7g
- Allies of Skin Azelaic & Kojic Advanced Clarifying Serum, 30ml
- The Ordinary Multi-Active Delivery Essence, 100ml
- 111SKIN Rose Gold Eye Mask, 1 sheet
- Medik8 Advanced Pro-Collagen+ Peptide Cream, 50ml
- VIEVE Super Skin Nova, 50ml
- PATRICK TA Major Headlines Double-Take Cream + Powder Blush Duo in She’s Giving, 10.5g
- Maria Nila Soothing Scalp Serum, 50ml
- Huda Beauty Lip Contour 2.0 in Warm Brown, 0.5g
- RMS Beauty Luminizer in Crystal Slipper, 4.82g
- Saie Dew Blush in Chilly, 12ml
- BYOMA Foaming Rice Deep Cleanser, 175ml
- Hourglass Unlocked Satin Creme Lipstick in Roar, 4g
- Paula’s Choice Clinical Pro Retinaldehyde Dual-Retinoid Treatment, 30ml
- Sunday Riley Tidal Deep Hydration and Plumping Serum, 30ml
Travel sizes (18)
- Fugazzi Fragrances Pomegranoudh, 10ml
- Escentric Molecules Escentric 01, 10ml
- KAYALI Musk Santal 34, 10ml
- Davines OI All in One Milk, 50ml
- K18 Biomimetic Hairscience AirWash Dry Shampoo, 47ml
- Kilian Angels’ Share Eau de Parfum, 7.5ml
- Sol de Janeiro Cheirosa ’48 Perfume Mist, 90ml
- Color Wow Xtra Large Bombshell Volumizer, 50ml
- Dr. LEVY Overnight Booster Cream, 20ml
- Milk Makeup Hydro Grip Primer, 10ml
- Sulwhasoo First Care Activating Serum V1, 8ml
- Charlotte Tilbury Airbrush Flawless Setting Spray, 34ml
- ELEMIS Pro-Collagen Skin Protection Fluid SPF50, 15ml
- Glow Recipe Watermelon Glow Niacinamide Dew Drops, 15ml
- By Terry Brightening CC Serum in Sunny Flash, 15ml
- Danessa Myricks Beauty Yummy Skin Liquid Blurring Balm Setting Spray, 50ml
- Gisou Honey Gloss Ceramide Therapy Hydrating Shampoo, 75ml
- Gisou Honey Gloss Ceramide Therapy Hydrating Conditioner, 50ml
Deluxe sizes (3)
- L’OCCITANE Almond Shower Oil, 35ml
- Anua PDRN Hyaluronic Acid 100 Moisturising Cream, 30ml
- Amika SoulStruck Nourishing Dry Hair Mask, 30ml
That Sol de Janeiro is listed as a travel size at 90ml, by the way. Ninety. That is a normal bottle of Cheirosa in most people’s houses.
A couple of these I’ve already written about at length. The Allies of Skin serum is azelaic acid and kojic acid together, and if you want to know how azelaic behaves on rosacea-prone skin before you commit, I tested two azelaic serums against each other for months. The ELEMIS SPF50 is the one skincare step I never skip, and my Korean sunscreen post goes into why texture matters as much as the number on the bottle.
That’s the Special Edition in full.
👉 Get the Cult Beauty advent calendar here
What’s inside the Cult Beauty advent calendar Signature Edition
Same price, 33 products, 19 of them full size. Skincare, makeup and hair, and that’s it, there’s no fragrance in this box at all.
Full sizes (19)
- Westman Atelier Eye Want You Mascara in Black, 8.5ml
- LANEIGE Cream Skin Cerapeptide Mist, 30ml
- Summer Fridays Lip Butter Balm in Iced Coffee, 15g
- MAKE UP FOR EVER Artist Color Crayon in 606 Wherever Walnut, 7g
- Allies of Skin Azelaic & Kojic Advanced Clarifying Serum, 30ml
- The Ordinary Multi-Active Delivery Essence, 100ml
- 111SKIN Rose Gold Eye Mask, 1 sheet
- Medik8 Advanced Pro-Collagen+ Peptide Cream, 50ml
- VIEVE Super Skin Nova, 50ml
- PATRICK TA Major Headlines Double-Take Cream + Powder Blush Duo in She’s Giving, 10.5g
- Maria Nila Soothing Scalp Serum, 50ml
- Fable & Mane HoliRoots Hair Oil, 55ml
- Huda Beauty Lip Contour 2.0 in Warm Brown, 0.5g
- RMS Beauty Luminizer in Crystal Slipper, 4.82g
- Saie Dew Blush in Chilly, 12ml
- BYOMA Foaming Rice Deep Cleanser, 175ml
- Hourglass Unlocked Satin Creme Lipstick in Roar, 4g
- Paula’s Choice Clinical Pro Retinaldehyde Dual-Retinoid Treatment, 30ml
- Sunday Riley Tidal Deep Hydration and Plumping Serum, 30ml
Travel sizes (12)
- Sol de Janeiro Body Badalada ’48 Lotion, 100ml
- Augustinus Bader The Rich Cream, 15ml
- Dr. LEVY Overnight Booster Cream, 20ml
- Milk Makeup Hydro Grip Primer, 10ml
- Sulwhasoo First Care Activating Serum V1, 8ml
- Charlotte Tilbury Airbrush Flawless Setting Spray, 34ml
- ELEMIS Pro-Collagen Skin Protection Fluid SPF50, 15ml
- Glow Recipe Watermelon Glow Niacinamide Dew Drops, 15ml
- By Terry Brightening CC Serum in Sunny Flash, 15ml
- Danessa Myricks Beauty Yummy Skin Liquid Blurring Balm Setting Spray, 50ml
- Gisou Honey Gloss Ceramide Therapy Hydrating Shampoo, 75ml
- Gisou Honey Gloss Ceramide Therapy Hydrating Conditioner, 50ml
Deluxe sizes (2)
- L’OCCITANE Almond Shower Oil, 35ml
- Anua PDRN Hyaluronic Acid 100 Moisturising Cream, 30ml
And that’s the Signature. You can shop the Cult Beauty advent calendar and pick this one from the edition buttons.
Signature or Special: what’s actually different
This is the part I had to read twice, so here it is plainly. Both boxes are £245 with the same stated value, and 29 of the products are identical. So it comes down to the handful that aren’t.
Cult Beauty flag nine products on the Special Edition as exclusive to it:
- Fugazzi Fragrances Pomegranoudh
- Escentric Molecules Escentric 01
- KAYALI Musk Santal 34
- Kilian Angels’ Share
- Sol de Janeiro Cheirosa ’48
- Davines OI All in One Milk
- K18 AirWash Dry Shampoo
- Color Wow Xtra Large Bombshell Volumizer
- Amika SoulStruck Nourishing Dry Hair Mask
Look at the shape of that. Five fragrances and four hair products. The Special Edition is the fragrance-and-hair one, so if you do the whole scent layering thing, or you’re rebuilding a hair routine from scratch, thats the one to go for.
The Signature Edition has four of its own that the Special doesn’t get:
- Augustinus Bader The Rich Cream, 15ml
- Fable & Mane HoliRoots Hair Oil, full size 55ml
- Summer Fridays Lip Butter Balm in Iced Coffee, full size 15g
- Sol de Janeiro Body Badalada ’48 Lotion, 100ml
Two of those are full size, which is part of why the Signature ends up with 19 full sizes off 33 products while the Special has 17 off 38. Fewer things in the box, more of them full size.
The Body Badalada ’48 is one I can actually speak to, because I bought and tried all three Body Badalada lotions and wrote up which one suits who. The ’48 is the one in this box.
The Augustinus Bader Rich Cream is the one that’ll make people pause. It’s a proper cult product and a 15ml is a real trial of it rather than a smear. If that’s the thing you’ve been curious about for years, the Signature is your box.
Otherwise it splits cleanly. Want fragrance and a hair styling and washing set? Special. Want two extra full sizes, the Augustinus Bader and a skincare-and-makeup box with no scent in it? Signature. Either way you can shop the Cult Beauty advent calendar here and pick your edition at checkout.
The bits I’d be most excited to open
I’m going to be honest about my own bias here, which is that I shaved my head back in July and I’m growing it out from scratch, so anything that goes on hair or scalp is currently getting far more attention from me than it would have done a year ago. The Maria Nila Soothing Scalp Serum is the one I keep going back to look at. Full size, 50ml, caffeine and peptides, goes on damp or dry. Scalp serums are one of those things I’d never spend forty-odd quid on as a standalone experiment, and a full size bottle turning up behind a door is exactly how I end up finding out whether I like something.
Same story with the K18 AirWash and the Gisou shampoo and conditioner pair. Two brands I’ve circled for ages without committing. The Gisou pair is a proper trial size too, 75ml and 50ml, which is enough washes to actually judge it.
Then there’s the Paula’s Choice Clinical Pro Retinaldehyde. Full size, 30ml. Retinaldehyde is a step up from retinol and a full bottle of the clinical one is the thing I’d pull out of the box first. In my forties this is the category I care about most and the one I’m least willing to gamble on, which is exactly why getting it inside a calendar rather than paying for it outright appeals to me.
The Patrick Ta blush duo I’d never have picked myself. Cream and powder in one compact. I’m not good at makeup, I’ve never pretended otherwise, and blush is about the only thing I can put on without a mirror and without ruining my face.
The Anua PDRN cream I already know I’ll get on with, because Anua textures suit me and PDRN is the ingredient everyone in K-beauty is talking about right now. If you want the longer version of that, it’s in my post on K-beauty for mature skin, alongside the Sulwhasoo First Care Serum that’s also in here.
And the fragrances. Kilian Angels’ Share at 7.5ml is a real handbag bottle of something I would never buy blind at full size. Same for the Escentric 01, which is one of those scents people have very strong feelings about, and now I get to find out where I land on it. Fragrance is a newer thing for me to write about, and my Dossier review was where I started working out how to describe a scent without sounding daft.
All of those sit in the Special Edition. If that’s the one you want, you can buy the Cult Beauty Advent Calendar Special Edition here.
The three golden tickets
Cult Beauty have hidden three golden tickets across the calendars this year, each worth a thousand Cult Beauty pounds. Three people are going to open a door in December and lose their minds.
It won’t be me. It’s never me. But somebody’s got to win it.
The charity bit and the artwork
Cult Beauty are partnering with MindOut this year, a charity working on mental health and wellbeing for LGBTQ+ communities, and they’ve said the collaboration is only starting rather than being a one-off Christmas thing.
The box itself is by Swindler & Swindler, a fine-line illustration studio who do all that Victorian botanical engraving work, flowers and foliage drawn out in enormous detail. It’s the sort of box that stays on a shelf in January.
Who I think this one suits
Already a Cult Beauty shopper and you recognise most of the names above? This is a very easy yes and you probably stopped reading three sections ago.
Newer to the brand, it’s a wide box. Skincare, makeup, hair, fragrance and a bit of body, so you’ll end up with things outside your usual lane. Some people love that. Some would rather have a calendar that’s all skincare, and I’ve written up a few single-brand ones below.
As a gift for someone whose exact taste you don’t know, the spread is the whole point. There’s very little in there that’s hard to like.
The other advent calendars I’ve written up this year
- LOOKFANTASTIC advent calendar 2026, with the full 27-product list and the grooming one
- Sephora advent calendar 2026 UK, all 40 products
- Benefit advent calendar 2026, the Hotel Beneville
- Clarins advent calendar 2026, the 12 day and the 24 day
- Clarins Christmas gift sets 2026, all forty four of them, if a calendar isn’t the gift you’re after
And if you’re wondering where I actually shop for all of this, here’s where I buy my beauty products.
FAQs
How much is the Cult Beauty advent calendar 2026?
£245 for the Special Edition, and the Signature Edition is the same price. Cult Beauty put the value of each at over £1,100. You can split it into four interest free instalments of £61.25 with Clearpay.
What’s inside the Cult Beauty Advent Calendar Special Edition?
38 products: 17 full size, 18 travel size and 3 deluxe size, across skincare, makeup, hair and fragrance. Brands include Westman Atelier, Sunday Riley, Kilian, KAYALI, Patrick Ta, Medik8, Paula’s Choice, Hourglass, Gisou, K18, Color Wow, Sol de Janeiro, Anua, Sulwhasoo and Charlotte Tilbury. The full list is above.
What’s the difference between the Signature and Special Editions?
Both are £245 with the same stated value, and 29 of the products are the same. The Special Edition has 38 products with 17 full size and includes fragrance. The Signature Edition has 33 products with 19 full size and no fragrance at all. Nine products are exclusive to the Special: Fugazzi Pomegranoudh, Escentric Molecules Escentric 01, KAYALI Musk Santal 34, Kilian Angels’ Share, Sol de Janeiro Cheirosa ’48, Davines OI All in One Milk, K18 AirWash, Color Wow Xtra Large Bombshell Volumizer and the Amika SoulStruck mask. Four are exclusive to the Signature: Augustinus Bader The Rich Cream, Fable & Mane HoliRoots Hair Oil, Summer Fridays Lip Butter Balm and the Sol de Janeiro Body Badalada ’48 Lotion.
What’s inside the Cult Beauty Advent Calendar Signature Edition?
33 products: 19 full size, 12 travel size and 2 deluxe size, across skincare, makeup and hair. There’s no fragrance in the Signature Edition. Brands include Westman Atelier, Augustinus Bader, VIEVE, Hourglass, Sunday Riley, Medik8, Paula’s Choice, Fable & Mane, Summer Fridays, Gisou, Anua and Charlotte Tilbury. The full list is above.
How many full size products are in it?
17 of the 38 in the Special Edition, and 19 of the 33 in the Signature Edition.
Can you get the Cult Beauty advent calendar in the US?
No. Cult Beauty state it can’t be shipped to the US, Canada or Argentina, and further shipping restrictions apply.
Can you pay in instalments?
Yes. Cult Beauty offer four interest free payments of £61.25 with Clearpay.
Do you earn Cult Status points on the advent calendar?
Yes, 245 Cult Status points, and it’s on double points at the time of writing. Spending £100 also gets you £5 off your next order.
Are there really golden tickets?
Yes, three of them, hidden across the calendars. Each is worth £1,000 to spend at Cult Beauty.
Who designed the Cult Beauty advent calendar box?
Swindler & Swindler, a fine-line illustration studio known for Victorian-inspired botanical engraving. Cult Beauty are also partnering with the charity MindOut this year.
Both editions sit on the same page, so you pick Signature or Special right there at checkout.
👉 Get the Cult Beauty advent calendar here
Affiliate links, I earn commission if you buy through them. I haven’t been sent this calendar, everything above comes from the official product listing.
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