The earliest recorded history a nail polish product is 3000 B.C., which is around the time writing was invented.  This means girls have wanted to have pretty toes since the beginning of recorded history, and likely much longer!  Girls today still want their toes to be pretty, but now they have a much wider range of options to choose from when painting their toenails. 

The following are the best nail polish brands in the world, and are ranked here because they are also the best selling, and consistently the most highly reviewed.  While each nail care product brand has qualities and features that make it unique to the others, all of the following brands are very high quality.  They all have many colors, dry quickly, are resistant to smudging and chipping, and have good overall consistency. 

1.  OPI Nail Colour

Hands down, America’s favorite nail polish is OPI Nail Colour.  They have a wide range of colors, from more traditional to classic to straight-up wild and extreme.  All their nail polish lasts a very long time before it starts to chip or fade.  Some popular collections include South Beach, Sephora, and Classics.  Reading the names they have is half the fun too!   ;)

2.  Essie Nail Polish

If OPI Nail Colour is the favorite, Essie Nail Polish is easily the runner up.  It is not as loud as its extreme counterpart, OPI, as it is a bit more conservative.  However, that doesn’t take away from the fact that it is also a very high quality nail polish.  

Most of the colors from Essie are in the girlier category, with most falling in shades of white, pink, purple, and red.  

3.  Zoya Nail Polish

Zoya is the third best nail polish brand, but it does have one very unique feature that makes it different from the prior two: it doesn’t contain any DBP.

About DBP: DBP is a toxic chemical found in many popular nail polishes, but only in small traces. DBP is useful for making the nail polish last longer after application. This toxic chemical can be harmful to pregnant mothers or small children in high quantities, but it has never been proven to be harmful in the small amounts that are found in nail polish. Even so, some mothers prefer not to take the risk, and so they opt to use a nail polish that contains no DBP. If you are looking for a nail polish without DBP, but still of high quality, Zoya is the way to go.

These three brands are all great nail polishes to use. Other good brands that deserve recognition include Avon, Sally Hansen, NARS, and NYC.

Supplemental nail products:

Nobody really wants to talk about these nails products, but the fact is, they are also important if you want pretty toes! You may have a great nail polish, but if you use a low quality basecoat or topcoat, your toenails aren’t going to look as good as they could. They aren’t the most creative nail products, but they are still worth including in this article!

Basecoats:

A very important nail product is the basecoat. A basecoat is used not only to strengthen and protect the nail before adding nail polish; it also helps the nail polish look better once it has been applied. Nail polish is made up of harsh chemicals, and could be damaging when applied to the nail directly. Basecoats contain ingredients like protein, aloe vera, vitamin e, and calcium, and these all help to make the nail healthier. It also provides a thin and even surface for the nail polish to be applied to.

The top five quality basecoats are:

1. Zoya Anchor Basecoat

2. Trind Basecoat

3. Essie Protein Basecoat

4. OPI Designer Series Basecoat

5. NARS Nails Basecoat.

Topcoats:

Topcoats are also important professional nail products. First off they protect your nail polish job, making it last longer, and keeping it from chipping. A second benefit to adding a topcoat is that it will give your toenails extra shine.

The top five quality topcoats are:

1. OPI Rapidry Topcoat

2. Essie to dry for Topcoat

3. Trind Topcoat

4. Zoya Armor Topcoat

5. Orly Won’t Chip Topcoat.

Nail Polish Remover:

Last but not least is the nail polish remover. Once you see that your initially beautiful nail polish application has started to chip and fade, you are ready for a new application! However, you don’t want to repaint your toenails on anything but clean, cut, and totally nail polish free toes. That is why using a good nail polish remover is important.

Here are the top five best nail polish removers on the market:

1. Trind Nail Polish Remover

2. OPI Expert Touch Polish Remover

3. Zoya Remove + Nail Polish Remover

4. Orly Slip It Off Nail Polish Remover

5. Soy Polish Remover by Priti.

That’s it! Trying to determine which product in each category is actually the best of the best is tough to do, but all the brands mentioned above are amongst the best nail products. At this point, its up to you to determine which ones are your favorites, and which combinations work best for you.

Please check out my other hub on how to give a great French pedicure at home.