How the Strategist Badging Program Works

Since 2016, our mission at the Strategist has been to help our readers shop the internet smartly, and in that time, our staff has researched, reviewed, and tested thousands of products in our never-ending quest to find the stuff that’s actually worth buying. Every product featured on our site is something that our writers and editors have chosen themselves and we fully recommend and believe in.

That’s why we’re excited to share the Strategist’s five editorial badges, which will make it even easier for readers to identify the things we love and that meet our very particular standards. If your brand has been featured in a Strategist story and you’d like to learn more about how to utilize the editorial badge on your products, reach out to Wright’s Media at [email protected] or click here. For even more information about licensing, including how to license any content other than awards badges, please check out Vox Media’s Permissions & Licensing FAQ page.

The Strategist 100 is our collection of the best, most-stood-behind products that have appeared on our website. Twice a year, our editors review our extensive archive and independently select our favorite products to feature, cherry-picking the already cherry-picked things to highlight the items that stand out from the pack and, in some cases, just deeply delight us. Each of the products featured in the Strategist 100 has previously been written about on our site.

Best in Class are the Strategist’s carefully curated and rigorously vetted flagship shopping guides. Every product featured has been independently selected by the author as a Best in Class option in the category, based on their own expertise, product testing, and reporting.

This Thing’s Incredible is an almost literary ode to a product that is really good and that we fully believe in. The products featured in This Thing’s Incredible are independently selected by our writers, contributors, and editors. We require that a writer, contributor, or editor have had significant hands-on experience with the product before writing a single-product ode.

The Strategist Beauty Brief is a weekly newsletter in which our beauty writers share what they really think about products in every category, including first impressions on new releases, quick takes on what’s trending, and deep dives into the stuff they use every day.

We cover hundreds of products in dozens of ways on the Strategist, whether it’s a writer hunting down the perfect pair of dark-wash jeans in a Strategist Hunt, an actor telling us about their favorite face wash in a Celebrity Shopping, or a few dozen people with exceptional taste recommending dinner plates in an Ask a Cool Person. This badge serves as a Strategist stamp of approval.

The Strategist is designed to surface the most useful, expert recommendations for things to buy across the vast e-commerce landscape. Some of our latest conquests include the best acne treatments, rolling luggage, pillows for side sleepers, natural anxiety remedies, and bath towels. We update links when possible, but note that deals can expire and all prices are subject to change.