BYS Nude 2 Palette Review + Swatches [Urban Decay Naked 2 Palette Dupe]

Hi beauties! Everyone and their mother is familiar with Urban Decay’s hugely successful Naked, Naked 2 and Naked 3 Palettes and with good reason. While I managed to get my hands on Naked 2 a few years ago, Urban Decay still hasn’t hit Aus. So, when I stumbled across a very familiar looking palette in Gloss the other night, I knew I had to review this potential Naked 2 palette dupe…

What is it?

BYS is an Australian discount makeup brand that is probably on par quality-wise with American brands like Wet N Wild or Kleancolour. Their palettes tend to be quite cheap looking and dominated by bright, shimmery shades. That makes this sleek take on Urban Decay Naked 2 palette all the more impressive.

The BYS Nude 2 palette ($14.95 AUD) comes in an almost identically sized tin to Naked 2, though its colour leans cooler. It contains twelve eyeshadows and two cheap dual-end makeup applicators. I wasn’t expecting a good quality brush, but the applicators do cheapen the presentation a little, right? Especially when they’ve otherwise gone to such pains to mimic the packaging, down to the handy mirror.

In terms of shades, you get 4 matte colours and 8 shimmery eyeshadows (Naked 2 offers 3 matte, 9 shimmer) . Each eyeshadow has a name that seems to loosely follow a clubbing theme. I think naming the colours was a very nice touch, but they dropped the ball in the text formatting. I spent several minutes wondering what a ‘Photoop’ was. 

How did it perform?

Here’s a break down of the shades:

•  Morning is a pale peach with a matte finish. It’s slightly less yellow-toned than Naked 2′s Foxy and a touch more pigmented. Unfortunately, it’s also a bit chalky and kicks up a lot of dust. I use this as a brow-bone highlight.

• Guest List is a burnt, brown copper with a shimmery finish. It’s not much of a dupe for the gold copper Half Baked present in Naked 2, but it is soft, highly pigmented and easy to apply.

•  Selfie is a yellow-beige with a matte finish. It suffers from the same chalkiness as Morning. And, while Selfie leans whiter, the shades are very similar. So, the choice not to make this shade shimmery like Naked 2′s Booty Call was probably a poor one. I’d love a shimmery highlight for the inner corner of my eyes.

• Flirt is a medium copper with a shimmery finish. It’s slightly cooler than Naked 2′s oranger Chopper and lacks the micro-glitter, but applies almost as smoothly and has great colour payoff.

• VIP is a mauve-leaning brown with a matte finish. It’s very similar to Naked 2′s Tease, but actually applies better and is slightly more pigmented.

• Photo Op (or Photoop, as the palette text says, lol) is a dark bronze with hints of gold shimmer. While my arm swatches may not reflect this well, on my lids, this colour is almost identical to Snakebite. Formula wise, it’s a hint grainier, but still applies with the same gorgeous butteriness its Urban Decay rival.

• Shots is what Temptalia refers to as a champagne bronze with a metallic finish. This is another lovely, buttery formula that closely mimics Urban Decay’s Suspect. One of my favourites from the palette.

• Smoke Machine is a cool-toned grey with a shimmery finish. It leans more blue silver than Naked 2′s Pistol, which is a lot closer to brown. This eyeshadow is also highly pigmented and easy to work with.

• D Floor (I think they were running out of names…lol) is a champagne beige with a shimmery finish. On the eye, it’s almost indistinguishable from Naked 2′s beautiful Verve and applies with similar ease.

• Pickup is a golden-toned bronze with a shimmery finish. It’s pigmented and applies nicely, but is nothing like Naked 2‘s complex frosted, medium brown YDK.

• Heels Off is a cordovan brown with a shimmery finish that almost looks silvery purple in some lights. It’s a pretty shade with no formula issues, but not much like Naked 2′s dark burgandy-tinted brown, Busted.

• Midnight is a matte black with slight chalkiness but intense colour pay-off. It’s very similar to Naked 2′s Blackout.

Now that you know how well each of the BYS Nude 2 eyeshadows perform, let’s take a look at the swatches alongside swatches of Urban Decay’s Naked 2 palette. Both are swatched over bare skin.

BYS Nude 2 Palette

Urban Decay Naked 2 Palette

I apologise for the slightly inconsistent lighting. If you scroll back up to my colour descriptions, you’ll see that on the lid, several of these look nearly identical.

I don’t have a huge problem with my eyeshadow creasing throughout the day (using just NYX’s jumbo pencil in Milk as a base). These were no exception. I’ve just spent the day with Photo Op, VIP and Midnight on one eye and Snakebite, Tease and Blackout on the other to create identical looks. Surprisingly the BYS shadows don’t look any worse for wear than the Urban Decay combo. 

Summary

• Classy packaging
• Eyeshadows are labelled
• Combo of matte and shimmery shades
• Majority have buttery, smooth textures
• Eyeshadows don’t crease or fade easily
• $14.95 for 12 eyeshadows
• Many colours are decent dupes for Naked 2 shades
• Comes with a mirror

• Case is slightly hard to open and shut
• Eyeshadow labelling looks a bit half-arsed
• A few chalky shades
• May be tricky to locate online or outside of Australia
• Applicators included look a bit cheap

Although a few of the matte colours are a little chalky, many of BYS’s Nude 2 palette eyeshadows perform exceptionally well and have a lovely, buttery texture. BYS could have tried harder to dupe YDK or given us a shimmery highlight colour like Bootycall, but that’s one of the only criticisms I have for the BYS Nude 2 palette.

A major plus here is that this dupe of Naked 2 is being produced by a relatively reputable brand for a similar price to those you can find on eBay and AliExpress from China. Having recently sampled a Chinese dupe of Naked Basics that was TERRIBLE (and probably toxic, lol), I can say that this is an awesome alternative for both beauty junkies on a budget ($14.95 vs $70ish) and Aussies who don’t want to deal with the hassle of trying to import a palette from the US.

Overall: Highly Recommended

Do you own naked 2? what’s your favourite naked dupe?

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