If I could do horrible things to the person who decided to change the formula of what was my HG primer...I would. I used to buy this 2 at a time just so I could have a back up on hand. The new formula is runny, oily and greasy. Makeup slide all over you face and you look like a hot mess. Old formula kept this uber shiny face at bay ALL DAY!!! And I was able to photograph well WITH Flash photography and studio lights with no white cast! I'm seriously ticked off by this. This replaced my HG Sofina Lucent and Shishiedo SPF 55. When you have very oily skin and you find something that works and DOESN'T break you out...its like the second coming. Thanks MAC for ruining all that is good!

I have been using this a primer and sunscreen since 2008. It used to work perfectly to control excess oiliness and make sure that the makeup stayed in place all day. It was so effective as a primer that I never had to use an eyeshadow primer before doing my eye makeup. The only difficulty was in removing because you needed a really strong makeup remover.

Now, the consistency is totally different. I thought my tube had gone bad because it deposits a weird lumpy white substance and a a cloudy liquid. Turns out, nope, formula has changed. Not cool! Why fix something that isn't broken?! Now it is way too drying on the skin...there is no way to combine the two separated substances AND it doesn't operate with the same hold as before.

I'm quite disappointed because now I have to find another primer with sunblock.

I’ve bought this product in Argentina. MAC here it’s not as cheap as in US, I could say it’s expensive. I thought as it’s a MAC product quality would be good, but after buying the cream, I read the reviews at MAC webpage, and comments were not good.
It’s a very heavy cream that the only thing it does is to control oil while not drying the skin, so make up stay in your face for more hours. Other good thing is the SPF 50, so you don’t have to add sunblock before makeup,but the smell is not good at all. It does not cover imperfections, nor have color.
I expected more from that cream. Maybe what Iwas looking for was a BB Cream instead of a prime and using foundation after that.

This was HG.....it was seriously a life-saver at controlling oil. Nothing compared.....until they changed the formula!!!!!!!!!!!!! D*mn you MAC!!!! I thought I had bought a dud until I came on here and found what others were saying. I'm so mad! Why did they have to ruin a perfectly good product???? I will never buy nor recommend anymore. Does nothing for oil control and caused a severe breakout (like had to go to the derm and get back on Spiro). STAY AWAY!!!!

I used this product from 2007 to 2012. It WAS once fantastic, then it was reformulated. Ruined. No warning and no information to tell us it had changed, but after using it exclusively daily for so long, when I opened the new tube, the change in formula was obvious from the texture and the fact it no longer mattified. Because the packaging is so dreadful, I have always decanted this into a small tub. The new formula separates into a gooey white paste and a slimy liquid. Disgraceful considering it was once an excellent product and there is no dupe and no equivalent product anywhere else in the Estee Lauder stable. This experience has really put me off MAC's product, despite their excellent eyeliner and quite good lippies. They should have withdrawn the old Prep & Prime if they could not manufacture it with the same formula rather than trying to sell new gunk under and old name. Grrr. continued >>

First of all, that smell!! What on earth is it? Which ingredient? Perhaps the sunscreen?

Secondly, and most importantly, this broke me out...really bad. I suspect its the Zinc Oxide but not sure. Definitely not recommended.

This used to be my only solution to control my oily skin. It used to be great and kept my oil at bay all day long. BUT MAC HAD TO GO AND CHANGE THE FORMULA!

Initially i thought maybe the product had separated because it sat there too long and thats why it became runnier. I shook it up and mixed it around but to no avail. When i went back to the store, ALAS! They had changed the formula. The formula now contains oxybenzone which is really bad for you!, It smells just like sunscreen and worse of all IT DOESNT CONTROLS OIL ANYMORE!

I have no idea what to try now since this was the only thing that had worked for me. So disappointed. Let me know if there are any other primers that can help control oil :/

Why did they reformulate this primer?! It was the one primer that controlled my oil all day AND had great sunscreen. I must have gone through 5 or 6 bottles of this stuff. It was fantastic. Then, about a couple of months ago, I bought another bottle and it was a completely different product! It was runny and smelled different. But the worst part of it was it no longer worked...AT ALL. At first I thought I got a bad bottle. So I went to a different store and asked them if the product had changed. The MUA swore it was the same product. I tried it again and still it was HORRIBLE. I'm really disappointed that they destroyed this primer. I don't know what I will find to replace it. I don't recommend spending money on this, as it is no more than a regular sunscreen and you can get that much cheaper. It does not control oil or prime the face in any way now. So sad.

I used this product religiously for years and years. It's true that the container was bad for the original product. The primer was thick and at the end I'd have to cut off the top of the bottle to get to all the product. It was worth it though, and I'd store it in another container at that point. However, the new formula, which I'm assuming was meant to address the problem of the thick product in poorly designed container, is terrible. Not only does it NOT WORK, it runs/leaks out of the bottle, leading to a lot of waste of the product.The solution to the old problem was a better container, not a reformulation of the primer. The only "good" thing I can say about the new reformulation is that is helped me realize how much I loved the old formula! I want it back!

EDIT: I had been using Mac's Prep and Prime Protect SPF 50 until the formula changed. I sampled multiple oil-control primers from Sephora (Murad, Roth, Clinique, Korres) and some drugstore brands (Boots, Cetaphil) from Target over the course of the past few months. I finally settled on Hourglass Veil Mineral and I love it. Interestingly, it has Titanium Dioxide and Zinc Oxide, two ingredients that, as I recall, were in the Mac Prep and Prime and removed and replaced by chemical sunscreens. Now I'm wondering if those sunscreen ingredients don't also have oil-control properties. None of the other primers I tried worked very well, and none of them had these two ingredients.

i had the old version of this primer and it was perfect, but a week ago i got the new formula and it sucks. every time i use it my face looks greasy and bad. also if you read the box the 3 main ingredients are sunscreens and nothing else. dont waste money on this.