How we research
The method, its sources, and its limits.
We do not test products
Start here, because it is the thing most review sites are vague about. We have no lab. We do not buy the products, run them for six weeks and report back.
What we do is read the people who did, compare what they found, and turn it into an answer to the question you came with.
Every claim names its source
If a guide says a bag's handle survived 30 kg of load, or that a pair of headphones flattens speech better than engine noise, the page says who measured that and links to them. Every guide ends with the full list of outlets we went through.
This is the difference between citing a number and reprinting one. We will happily republish a lab's measurement — that is the whole method — but never without saying whose lab it was.
We prefer agreement between independent sources
A product recommended by one outlet is a data point. A product recommended by four, tested separately, is a finding. Where sources disagree, the guide says so rather than picking the one that suits the ranking.
A guide built on a single source is a rewrite of one article, and we do not publish those.
The ratings are ours, the evidence is not
The score on each pick is our editorial judgement, formed from the testing named beneath it. It is not an average of other people's scores, and it is not a measurement — those are two different kinds of precision and we do not want to imply either.
Prices are checked, and then they move
Every guide carries the date its prices were last checked. Prices change constantly, and a figure on this page is a snapshot, not a promise. The retailer's own page is always the authority.
We re-check
Guides carry the date they were last verified, not just the date they were written. Products get discontinued and testing gets superseded. A guide nobody has re-opened in two years is a guide to a shop that no longer exists.
Where we stop
We are not a substitute for professional advice. Where a purchase touches health — mattresses and back pain, footwear and foot problems, air quality and allergies — the guides say plainly that the question belongs with a clinician, not a buying guide.