With the constant flurry of beauty launches comes a world of promises. From skincare formulas that claim to give your skin a glass-like glow to make-up innovations that vow to stay put for 24+ hours. Then, there’s the hair market.

Case-in-point: L’Oréal Paris Elvive Dream Lengths 8 Second Wonder Water, £9.99. You might have spotted this orange and pink bottle all over your Instagram feed, and for good reason. L’Oréal Paris claims that this formula leaves hair shinier, smoother and hydrated in just eight seconds. Yep, eight seconds. A pretty big claim, right?

While I initially dismissed it as clever marketing, I couldn’t help but be curious. The ends of my hair gets very dry (especially due to a lack of haircuts at the moment) and any time I run out of conditioner, my hair feels brittle. So, a nourishing conditioner is a staple in my haircare routine. Plus, one bottle sells every minute in the US.

This L’Oréal Paris liquid conditioner relies on a special type of ingredient known as lamellar water. This breakthrough technology utilises lightweight molecules to deliver amino acids to the surface of the hair shaft to make it smoother. The lamellar water coats the hair fibres to heal any signs of damage without the need for silicones.

L’Oréal recommends using it in the shower in place of your usual conditioner. Once my hair was double shampooed, I ran the nozzle along the lengths of my hair – a technique I often do with traditional conditioners as that’s where my hair needs the most hydration and nourishment. I found the application a bit tricky. The water consistency made it difficult to achieve precise application compared to the thicker formulas I tend to slather on. Plus, you’re applying a watery formula onto wet hair so I went in a bit heavy-handed.

The instructions advise using three doses on thick, long hair. Once it was in (and admittedly, my bottle was a lot lighter in weight), I gently rubbed the formula into the mid-lengths and ends for eight seconds to activate the formula. Then, I washed it out as normal.

Over the last year at home, I’ve taken to letting my hair air dry. While it was soaking wet, I wrapped it in a microfibre towel to soak up excess water, brushed it with my handy WetBrush and let it do its thing. When it was fully dry, I was really surprised.

My ends were left so much softer than usual and my hair just looked a lot shinier. I have a lot of broken hairs that poke out along the lengths of my hair (again, a lack of haircuts – yes, I’m desperate to sit in a salon chair). While a fair amount still stuck out around the crown of my head (the area I didn’t apply the product, to be fair), this liquid conditioner did a great job at smoothing them out along the lengths.

My only gripe? After using this a few times, I can see that it’ll be easy for me to get through a bottle pretty quickly. However, when it’s priced at just £9.99, I don’t have much of a reason to not stock up.

Main image: Hanna Ibraheem/L’Oreal Paris