How the longevity finder works

Each perfume gets one longevity band: the one that wearers report most often. The bands are very weak (1–2 hours), weak (2–4 hours), moderate (4–6 hours), long-lasting (6–8 hours) and eternal (8+ hours). Projection works the same way, with four labels: intimate, moderate, strong and enormous.

These bands describe typical wear on skin. Your own result depends on your skin, the weather, how much you apply and where you spray, so treat the hours as a guide and not a promise.

To rank perfumes, we put the longest band first. Inside a band, perfumes whose reports lean toward the longer end of it come ahead of those that lean shorter. Remaining ties follow the order of our best sellers.

A perfume appears in the finder only when enough wearers have reported on both its longevity and its projection. Perfumes without that information are left out rather than guessed at, and we never show a count of reports on these pages.

The two projection presets use the same rule. Strong projection lists perfumes of 6 hours or more with a strong or enormous label. Close to skin lists perfumes of 6 hours or more with an intimate or moderate label.

A gender page includes perfumes marked for that gender and unisex perfumes that lean toward it. The unisex page lists perfumes marked unisex.

The best way to confirm a match is to wear it. Every perfume in the finder is available as a decant, so you can live with a scent for a few days before you decide on more.