This page explains how Tomtops chooses the products it recommends, what we verify, what we do not do, and how the site makes money. It applies to every buying guide on this site. If a guide ever contradicts what is written here, this page is the one that is correct, and we want to know about it.
What we do not do
We do not perform hands on testing, and we will never say that we do. A large share of the buying guides you will find online claim laboratory testing that did not happen, and we would rather be the site that says plainly what its method is. When you read that we picked, chose, weighted or verified something, those verbs are literal.
We also do not accept payment for placement. No brand can buy a position in a guide, and no brand sees a guide before it is published.
How products get selected
Every candidate has to clear the same bar before it can appear in a guide:
- In stock at the time of writing, not a listing that has quietly gone dormant
- A rating of 4.4 stars or better, across a review count large enough to mean something
- No Frequently Returned Item banner on the listing
- Verified on its own product page, because search result titles are truncated and often resolve to a different variant than they appear to
Products that fail the bar get dropped even when they are the obvious pick on paper. In a recent guide on diapers, six of the brands that market hardest at the topic were removed for falling below the ratings threshold. We report those removals in the guide rather than quietly filling the gap.
Picks are then matched to use cases rather than ranked from best to worst. A ranked list implies one product wins for everybody, which is almost never true. Our guides say who each pick suits and, just as importantly, who it does not.
How we verify claims
Every factual claim in a guide has to be traceable to something we actually read. In practice that means one of three sources, in descending order of preference:
- A published standard, certification or dataset from an independent body, named in the text so you can check it
- A manufacturer specification or disclosure on the product listing itself
- Arithmetic we did ourselves, such as cost per unit, labelled as approximate at the time of writing
If a value cannot be verified, we drop it rather than guess. A comparison column with one invented cell is worse than no column at all.
How we handle health and safety topics
Some of what we cover touches health, and baby and child products especially. On those topics we cite named authorities directly, such as the American Academy of Pediatrics, the Mayo Clinic or a published systematic review, and we quote what they actually say rather than what a product page claims they say.
Where the evidence does not support a marketing claim, we say so, even when saying so weakens the case for buying anything at all. Nothing on Tomtops is medical advice, and no product recommendation here replaces a conversation with a doctor, a pediatrician or a pharmacist.
How Tomtops makes money
Tomtops is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program. When you buy through a link on this site we may earn a commission, at no additional cost to you. Full detail is on our affiliate disclosure page.
Commission rates vary between product categories, which creates an obvious temptation to steer readers toward whatever pays best. We handle that by choosing products before checking anything about commission, and by refusing to display prices in our product cards, so a guide cannot quietly become a pricing pitch.
Corrections and updates
Product listings change constantly. Models get discontinued, variants get swapped behind the same listing, and specifications get revised without notice. We revisit guides periodically and each one carries the month it was last verified.
If you find something on this site that is wrong, out of date or misleading, tell us through the contact page and we will correct it. Corrections are made to the article itself rather than buried in a note at the bottom.
Last updated August 2026.