The sonic boom in skincare

Dreamed up by the inventor behind the hugely successful Sonicare toothbrush, the Clarisonic Skin Care System brush (£150, www.spacenk.co.uk) applies the same "sonic technology" to bouncing the dirt gently out of your pores. Its bristles spin 300 times a second and it's comparable to the difference between using a manual or an electric toothbrush. It's a difference you can see, especially on the grungy bits around the nose where bits of make-up or dead skin tend to hang about, and it appears to help skin conditions such as rosacea and mild acne.

General skin condition improves, too. Products absorb better and wrinkles, so the studies show, appear softer. Celebs and dermatologists are all raving about it. Now I'm hooked, too, and am chivvying my teenage daughters and my husband to use it (so good for the bumpy bits on the back of my eldest's arms and for softening the bristles on my husband's chin before shaving). Put it on your Christmas list and, in the meantime, make do with the Neutrogena Wave (£12.99, Superdrug, Boots), a cute battery-powered cleanser with a vibrating motion to better de-clog pores, especially if you use the new blackhead-busting pads that cost £4.99 for a pack of 30.

Another brilliant new gadget is the handheld Tua Trend (£209, www.tuatrendface.com, 0845 434 7990), a newer, cleverer version of the popular Tua Viso, which exercises facial muscles with electrical impulses and is good for tautening saggy necks as well as boosting general facial firmness. It's very easy to use; the
full workout involves five zones of the face, or you can just pick the bits that bother you most.

Similar, though more expensive and even more hyped, is Slendertone Face (£300 at Harrods, but watch out, there are already thousands on the waiting list) works on restoring the "natural architecture of the face" by applying Slendertone's muscle-exercising technology to the crucial areas of the face.

For the hirsute, the most exciting home-use machine (it's too sophisticated to be called a gadget) is Smooth Skin (£299, Boots), an IPL (intense pulsed light) machine with enough technology to give decent results zapping body and facial hair into extinction. I was using it earlier this summer and can report that, if you use it as directed and persist, you will start to see a reduction in the amount of hair-regrowth after a couple of months. It's not too painful either.

One device that's better left to the professionals is the Dermaroler (www.genuinedermaroller.co.uk). In salons, it costs £250 a session to have the sharper-than-a-needle pinpoint blades run repeatedly over your face. The direct trauma to the skin stimulates collagen renewal that should result in your skin becoming firmer and more glowing. Brad and Angelina are allegedly big fans (it's also popular for softening acne scarring). Having tried it, I can tell you it's not pain-free and will leave your face tomato-red for 24 hours, then dry and sunburned-looking for a couple of days more as it struggles to regenerate. Ten days on, mine is looking good, but I'm not sure I'd do it again.

Much kinder to roll on your face are the little rubbery pads attached to the arms of  L'Oréal's Revitalift Pro-Contouring Anti-Wrinkle Tautening Cream (£15.99, everywhere). These give your face a quick, lymph-draining massage that helps with contouring before you apply the special firming cream. 

And then there's the Emwave Personal Stress Reliever (£125, www.relax-uk.co.uk, 01206 767300) not exactly a beauty gadget though goodness knows, we'd all look a bit more lovely if we could wipe the stress from our faces. This I'm not getting on so well with. It's easy enough to use — you clip the pulse monitor to your earlobe and the machine informs you, by the colour of light it shows, whether you are calm or stressed.
When thinking kind happy thoughts or when in the zone and typing like a maniac, I'm a blue or green, but otherwise — reading emails or getting cross, the light is an unremitting red until I pause, make my breathing slower and my thoughts more serene. Simple, but spot on. Must try harder.