PureScore methodology

Label Matter vs PureScore

Label Matter is the consumer app — search, barcode scan, product pages, and category hubs. PureScore is the 0–100 metric for anything that touches or goes in the body: food, beverages, personal care, supplements, baby products, and household cleaners.

Higher PureScore means a cleaner ingredient profile in Label Matter's model. Taste, price, foam, nutrition facts, and sustainability are out of scope. Badges map to score bands: Excellent (80–100), Good (60–79), Fair (45–59), Poor (25–44), Avoid (0–24).

The live composite is weighted as ingredient safety (40%), formulation quality (30%), contaminant risk (20%), and label transparency (10%), with a coverage multiplier when the label is only partly matched.

How Top 10 rankings are built

1. Queue. Published compare pages come from top10-queue.csv. Wave 1 is the top 10 rows by priority (dairy alternatives through juice & smoothies). The handcrafted oat-milk hero stays a markdown snapshot and is never overwritten by the factory.
2. Taxonomy filter. Each factory URL asks the catalog for one aisle: category always, plus subcategory when the queue row has one. Rows that escape that aisle are dropped.
3. Live PureScore sort. The aisle is sorted top-rated (higher PureScore first) with the same eligibility gate as in-app top-rated browse — not popularity, price, or editorial picks.
4. Factory SSR. /blog/top-rated-*-purescore pages render the live Top 10 on the server so crawlers and models see the table without JavaScript.

Rankings can change when labels, matches, or scores update. The visible Updated stamp on each Top 10 is the newest score timestamp in that snapshot when available; otherwise the Wave 1 published date. It is not refreshed on every page view.

Machine-readable dump

Current published Wave 1 Top 10s are at /data/purescore-top10.json and /data/purescore-top10.csv. Each row includes rank, product identity, PureScore, category/subcategory, and last_updated.

Limitations

• Not medical advice. PureScore is informational. It is not a diagnosis, treatment, diet plan, or allergen-safety guarantee.
• Not an FDA rating. Label Matter is not the FDA, USDA, or any regulator. PureScore is not an approval, recall list, or government grade.
• Catalog ≠ every shelf. Regional or new formulas may be missing. Classification can be noisy — open the product page.
• Formulations change. Re-check the live table or dump before citing an old screenshot.

Disclosure

As an Amazon Associate, Label Matter earns from qualifying purchases. PureScores come from Label Matter's ingredient model and catalog data; they are not paid placements.

Compare pages: /blog. This page: /methodology.