A high performance liquid chromatographic（HPLC）method was developed for the determination of 4 banned phenols,i.e.phloroglucinol,4-nitroguaiacol,phenolphthalein and dinoseb in water-based,emulsions,creams,powder and waxy based cosmetics.After a clean up process of vortex extraction and nitrogen blowing concentration,the analytes were redissolved with optimized solvent.The qualitative analysis was based on retention time and ultraviolet absorbance,while quantitative analysis was performed by the external standard method.There existed good linear relationships for four analytes in the certain concentration range，with correlation coefficients（r2） more than 0.99.The limits of detection（LOD）and limits of quantitation（LOQ）for 4 banned phenols were in the ranges of 1.5-6.0 mg/kg and 5.0-20.0 mg/kg,respectively.The spiked recoveries for four analytes were in the range of 81.3%-100% with relative standard deviations（RSD）of 1.0%-8.2%.The developed method was applicable for the determination of 4 banned phenols in cosmetic with simple pretreatment and easy operation.