Prep Your Nails
It all starts with a good base!
Properly prepping your nails before polish is essential. Follow these steps for a long-lasting manicure:
- Remove ALL old nail polish with cotton pads and remover. DON’T peel off your nail polish, this will rip layers of your actual nail off as well.
- File and cut nails to your preference.
- Buff your nails with a nail bluffing block (found at all local drugstores) about once or twice a month. Doing more often will wear away your nails too quickly.
- Wash your hands before applying hand lotion and cuticle oil. Let nails dry completely.
- Apply any type of base coat before your nail polish. This will give your nails extra protection and provide something even for the nail polish to adhere to.
Paint Evenly
Nobody likes clumps!
When you’re painting your nails, be sure to apply even strokes using one swiping motion. Start at the base of your nail and stroke upward towards the tip. Be sure to start in the middle of the nail and finish with the outer sides. Lastly, finish off the look by flipping the brush parallel towards the end of your nail and painting on the tip back and forth.
You can use Q-tips dipped in nail polish remover to clean up the skin around your nails. Leaving polish that spills from your nails to skin will usually make the polish chip more quickly.
If you have trouble painting your nails evenly (especially with your non-dominant hand), consider this handy tool from Julep, the “Plié Wand.” According to Julep, “An ergonomic nail polishing tool designed to solve common polishing pain points and give you better results. Imagine if you’d spent your whole life writing with a pen cap and then someone finally handed you a full-size pen. That’s what it feels like to polish with the Plié Wand.”
Protect Your Polish
Introducing my nail polish holy grail product…
…Sally Hansen’s Miracle Gel Top Coat! I won’t paint my nails without this product anymore! It’s perfect: it applies smoothly, it dries quickly, and most importantly makes my polish chip-free!
Using this product on top of your nail polish is just as important as the prep work I recommended before applying polish. This product is advertised to be used with Sally Hansen’s Miracle Gel polishes, but don’t worry, it works perfectly with any type of nail polish; although, the Miracle gel formulation is one of my favorite types of regular nail polishes to use as well!
Maintain Your Topcoat
Rethink how often you apply your topcoat.
So for most people, your nails are lucky if they even receive one top coat after polish is applied! Well I’m here to change that mentality! This is the MOST effective tip I have for making your polish last!
Everybody’s polish needs a little extra help day after day, no matter what the brand or price tag is. The tip to prolong your beautiful polish is to reapply your topcoat every 2-3 days. This doesn’t need to be a time consuming task, simply swipe on a coat of top coat polish to your nails every few days, and you’ll be amazed how much longer your nails last.
I’d highly suggest my holy grail product mentioned above, Sally Hansen’s Miracle Gel Topcoat. 🙂
allison kehoe 
I have to try these products! I think I’ve been using a bad base coat because the polish just seems to peel right off after a few days… Do you recommend one?
I’ve been using the Ulta brand base coat, and it’s been working really well! They always have sales where it’s only about $2 too! http://www.ulta.com/ulta/browse/productDetail.jsp?productId=xlsImpprod3570049