FabFitFun is a subscription service that sends full-sized beauty products every three months — here's what you can expect to find in an average box

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• FabFitFun is a popular subscription service that sends boxes of full-sized beauty products and other goodies once every season.
• How it works: For $49.99 once every three months, you'll receive a box that's worth over $200. The contents can be partly customized or you can opt for it to be a total surprise.
• I've received a few boxes and I think they provide a great value. They help me discover cool and fun beauty products, gadgets, and accessories that I may not have otherwise known existed.

For some people, beauty subscription boxes are an ideal way to find new products. They only require a small investment of time and money and, in exchange, you get exposure to diverse products handpicked by experts.

But if you've ever subscribed to one, you might find that you accrue tiny sample bottles faster than you can use them. I've personally found that monthly arrivals are too frequent for my lifestyle; they always seem to grow into a small sample store under my bathroom counter, like a miniature travel-sized shopping mall.

If you like the idea of subscription boxes but would prefer to get full-sized products, you might want to look into FabFitFun, the subscription service that delivers members a box every three months.

For $49.99 per shipment, FabFitFun boxes feature over $200 worth of full-sized beauty products and a seasonal collection of goodies, gadgets, and accessories.

Here's how FabFitFun works:

1. Order the box. For $49.99, you'll get a box filled with over $200 worth of full-sized products hand-picked by the FabFitFun team. This signs you up for a seasonal membership, so you'll be charged $49.99 and sent a box of goodies four times a year.
2. Customize it. Choose products and add-ons each season that you want in your box. Or, keep it all a surprise.
3. Check out the perks of membership. FabFitFun members can save up to 70% on box add-ons, capsule sales, and exclusive offers from their brand partners. You'll also get access to its workout videos platform, FABFITFUNTV.

Here's what you can expect to be in a box:

The majority of each box consists of full-sized beauty products, but you can also always expect a few gadgets and seasonal accessories.

I was recently sent the winter FabFitFun box, and while I wasn't involved in any kind of customization process, I liked the contents even as a total surprise. It had a good mix of new products — like a MakeUp Eraser that removes makeup with just water — and popular items I'd wanted to try, like Frank Body Original Coffee Scrub and Prep Rally Prime & Prep Detangler from Drybar. The diversity helped me expand my horizons, and get around to trying some new products I'd been eyeing anyway.

Bought separately, the products in my FabFitFun box would likely total more than $50. I did some research and found that the Makeup Eraser is $20 on Amazon and Sephora, the Frank Body Coffee Scrub is $17 on Revolve, and the Karuna Face For All set is $42 on Revolve. So, if you like the products you end up with, you'll probably have saved a bit on each one. And, if you wind up with something you'll likely never use, like the UnHide blanket for me, you can re-gift or donate.

The bottom line:

For me, the real appeal of using FabFitFun is mostly that it narrows down products to be seasonally relevant and gives me the opportunity to have fewer but bigger-sized things to try out. That way, I end up with fewer bottles to send to the landfill and don't have to quickly buy a full-sized version of the one thing I really did like in my box.

Overall, In my small apartment, I appreciate the lack of clutter and the seasonal box of gifts I'd probably never curate for myself. If that sounds good to you, then I'd say FabFitFun boxes are worth it.

If you decide to bite the bullet, you can get your first box for $10 cheaper using the code "INSIDER" at checkout.