Essie Stay Longer Ultimate Top Coat

I find most top coats while they look good to start, don't protect the nail polish and chipping happens fast - especially toes, with the daily shoe wearing etc. Well not with the Essie Stay Longer Ultimate Top Coat!

I've had it on my toes, over a bright red Essie polish for two weeks, and no chips in sight! It goes on so easily - so you can easily apply a thin coat, with no mess, and the polish looks pretty and glossy the whole time.

I painted my daughters nails - and she's brutal with polish - and it lasted better than any other top coat - not 2 weeks but we got close to a week before there was really obvious chipping.

Really really love the high shine too of this top coat. It's really stand out. All in all - I love this Top Coat and it will be a staple for me for fingers and toes.

This top coat has a really nice finish to it. My favourite part would be the size of the brush, much wider than other top coats I own so it makes applying a breeze. I did not notice it made my polish last any longer than my other branded top coats.

I'll start out by saying I'm a huge fan of Essie polishes. However I was a little let down by this top coat.

Pros: As per most Essie polishes, it was easy to apply and the formula settled well on the nail (no brush strokes visible). It also dried quickly, which is always a plus for me (nothing bothers me more than waiting for polish to dry...)

Cons: It's not a very shiny top coat (maybe less of a con for others, but I love a good shiny finish!). It also didn't feel like it extended my mani very much, I noticed a few chips and peeling around day 5.

I think applying a second layer of top coat a few days after the initial top coat would help extend the wear, but that sort of defeats the purpose.

I paint my nails almost every week. I'm not a fan of gel polish or other long-wear polish options ie. dipping powder because of the removal process that no matter how tediously careful leaves them paper thin. This does mean that I spend a couple of hours a week towards having neat polished tips. For some background on my day-to-day in terms of my activities with regard to my manicure longevity with regular polish, I rinse and load the dishwasher, with serious, cleaning, handwashing dishes, and chores involving detergents I wear gloves and when I'm cooking dinner I wear gloves, I cook dinner 3 nights a week. But I do cook my breakfast and prep my lunch in the morning without gloves which involves a bit of chopping. I have short nails because I work doing deep tissue and facial massage. I'm a frequent hand-washer as well. I don't spend time soaking in the bath but I take longer hot showers. Essie is my favourite brand of polish because I like the rounded tip of the brush, that makes it easier for me to do a neater job near the cuticle. I have been using Essie's All-in-One Base and Top Coat which for reference starts wearing off at the tips in about two days. I usually do 2 coats of that over my colour and by the second day the colour is slightly worn off on the tips but not that noticeable since I wear nude shades. At the time of writing this review, I'm halfway through my bottle of Essie All-in-One so it's thickened and takes a while to dry completely. I read the instructions for Essie Stay Longer and it said to just do one layer of the top coat. So once my colour was dry and won’t leave imprints if I touched it, I applied a thin layer of Essie Stay Longer and capped the tips. It went on smoothly; I could see just a smidge of my colour come off on the brush when I painted the top coat. Waited for the top coat to completely dry and be non-imprintable before doing anything else. The next day I had a hard chip of polish come off on one of my ring fingers, so just painted a bit over the chipped area with my colour and painted over the whole nail with another layer of Essie Stay Longer. The following day I had another hard chip of polish come off the tip of my middle finger so I did the same thing as I did the previous day. The manicure stayed looking fine and started wearing off at the tips within a few days. I didn't have any more hard chipping that week. The next week I painted my nails I opted for two coats of Essie Stay Longer, to see how long my mani would last this time. My middle finger chipped the next day, so I fixed it up. And then polished chipped off the side of my other middle finger the next day and the tips wore off like usual. I wouldn’t say this top coat out performs any of the other ones I have tried from Essie. I probably would try another top coat I haven’t tried from Essie to see if it’s better than this one.

I was very excited to try Essie Stay Longer Ultimate Top Coat as it claims to be a premium longwear top coat for an up to 7 day salon quality manicure. I normally have to remove my nail polish around the 3erd day as I am very rough with my nails, so if it could last a week … Amazing! For best results, it should be paired with an Essie polish to keep the color smooth, bright and shiny. In my case I tried it with an OPI polish as I felt like that color at that moment. Applying the top coat was very smooth and made the polish brighter and shinier, really improving the color. It took about 5 minutes to dry. I was impressed by day 3 because there were no chips and the color was still bright and shiny. The first chips appeared by day 5 but they were minimal and not very noticeable. Overall, I am very happy with Essie Stay Longer Ultimate Top Coat, it didn’t last salon quality manicure for a week but it did a very good job, better than others I tried before.

This top coat delivers on its promise. As someone who leads an active lifestyle (gym and sports), I was amazed that my polish lasted this long.

The formula glides on effortlessly and the colour definitely stayed vibrant and glossy, and I was blown away by the shine it added. Throughout the week, my nails remained smooth and bright.

I noticed some minor chipping around day 7, but this durability is exceptional considering my active routine.

I loved the packaging of this product. The red, white and silver was really elegant. The bottle itself is a standard rectangular Essie bottle, which I also really enjoy the design of. The red carried over to the bottle which was a nice touch.

The instructions/'Usage' information on the packaging was pretty brief, and I was surprised it didn't tell me to start with a base coat. It said to use on top of an Essie polish, so I chose Essie 'Chastity' from my collection which is a pink creme. I applied two coats of colour (waiting 5 minutes between coats) and then after 15 minutes I applied the top coat.

The brush was nice and wide, which I was surprised about as the brush on the colour I used was very thin. The wide brush was great as it only took two swipes to cover my nail and meant I didn't smudge the colour underneath at all. I did notice a tiny bit of colour on the brush after application, even though I had waited 15 minutes.

After applying the top coat I tried not to touch my nails until I went to bed - which was about 5 hours after application. That paid off, I woke up with no sheet marks on my nails which I was so happy about. I also noticed that the top coat made the colour on my nails look so smooth and glossy. My nails also felt super shiny.

After 3 days, only slight tip wear on a couple of nails. Really good going for me as I can often have chips after a day!

By day 7, I did have some chips but my nails were still so shiny! I had cleaned and done dishes all week, and also typed all day for 5 days for my job.

I have tried quite a few top coats and this one is amazing. I'm looking forward to trying it over other brands to see if it performs as well.

I wanted to leave this review for the last minute so I could truely test this product out and I can safely say it’s probably one of the best top coats I’ve used to date! I absolutely hate the fact that when I apply polish it comes off after a day or so. I’ve had this on for about a week and am super happy with the results! Hardly any chipping and still super shiny! I’m pretty tough on my hands at work and constantly doing dishes and my polish still looks pretty good! I don’t tend to use normal polish because of the reason that it never lasts long and usually go straight for the gels, but I am happy to say I will most likely reach for some of my normal polishes now! I used a Revlon nail polish underneath this time so am interested to see how it will go with some of my cheaper polishes in my collection. Also found that it dried pretty quickly which I love! I don’t get a lot of time to myself these days with a young child so when I get to pamper myself I love when it’s quick and easy if I have a million other things to do! I would probably use this by itself if I’m not wanting any colour on my nails but want to look shiny and healthy 😄

Finally a top coat that doesn't turn your nails into a fly trap. Not tacky at all! I'm quite hard on my claws and this definitely extended the life of my polish. It does have that very strong polish smell, which I don't mind but others might find a tad overpowering. If you are looking for a product to extend your polish beyond the usual few days and up to a week without chips, this is for you.

I'm always looking for a good top coat and I really like this one. I tested it over a red Essie polish and it lasted about 5 and a half days before any signs of chipping.

I'd been wearing polish by itself for a while because I'd run out of my previous top coat and it just wasn't lasting too well. I find polish chips on my nails easier than others, but this top coat helped a lot. It also gives a great shine and dries fairly quickly. I'd definitely recommend it.