Microcurrent devices, compared on output you can verify

Microcurrent passes a very small electrical current through facial tissue. Small is the operative word: the therapeutic range runs in millionths of an amp, which is far below the threshold at which you would feel a shock and comfortably below the current used in muscle stimulation elsewhere on the body. The effect people buy it for, a visible lift along the jaw and brow, is real and is also short-lived. It is a routine, not a one-off purchase.

Microamps. NuFACE publishes its figure: the TRINITY+ delivers up to 340 microamps, and the Boost button adds 25 more. That is a number you can hold a device to. It is also, remarkably, close to the only such number in the category.

ZIIP publishes a range rather than a ceiling, which is a different and arguably more informative claim: the Halo runs from 900 nanoamps to 400 microamps across up to 23 waveform combinations. The nanocurrent floor is three orders of magnitude below the microcurrent ceiling, and ZIIP's whole argument is that the shape of the waveform matters as much as its amplitude.

FOREO publishes no microamp figure for the BEAR line. Medicube publishes none for the AGE-R devices. Both sell on mode count instead: seven modes, six intensity levels, dual heads. Modes are not output. If a device will not tell you how much current it delivers, you cannot compare it to one that will, and that is a choice the manufacturer made.

Microcurrent facial devices sit under FDA product code NFO, over-the-counter powered facial toning. We searched the public database device by device.

NuFACE has the deepest record in the category, going back to 2007: the TRINITY+ is K201782 (January 2021), the MINI is K191672 (October 2019), the FIX+ is K240564 (June 2024), and the Trinity+ Wrinkle Reducer attachment carries its own separate clearance, K212947, under the wrinkle-reduction code. ZIIP holds K161484 for the original ZIIP Device and K212342 for the ZIIP+, though we could not find a record naming the Halo specifically. FOREO holds K200803 covering BEAR and BEAR mini. Medicube returns nothing at all.

None of that makes an uncleared device dangerous. It does mean that when two devices cost about the same and one has a clearance record you can read, the other one is asking for more trust than it has earned.

Microcurrent needs a conductive medium to cross the skin barrier. Run a device on dry skin and you get nothing, plus an uncomfortable tingle where the probe drags. Every brand sells its own gel and most would prefer you bought it; a generic aloe-based conductive gel works for most devices, with the exception of app-driven systems that specify their own. Budget for it the way you would budget for razor blades. Our gel guide covers what actually has to be in it.

There are two timelines and brands blur them deliberately. The immediate effect, a visible lift that lasts somewhere between a few hours and a couple of days, is the one you see in before-and-after photos taken twenty minutes apart. The cumulative effect, which is what you are actually paying for, requires the protocol: NuFACE specifies five sessions a week for sixty days before dropping to two or three. Miss the first sixty days and you have bought a device that does a party trick. We lay out the realistic timeline here.

Microcurrent is contraindicated with implanted electrical devices including pacemakers, during pregnancy, and over areas with active malignancy or recent injectables. These are not legal boilerplate; they are the manufacturer's own contraindications and they are short enough to read in full. We have collected them in one place.

Start with the main roundup for a decision, or how microcurrent works if you want the mechanism first.