I've spent a long time getting singles and then finally I got the courage to buy a 4-pack because even though there are 24 patches in each packet, I burn through them like crazy fast, especially during my time of the month when I end up with a lot of smaller acne on my chin. They prevent most of my pimples from leaving scars/PIH and are discrete enough to wear outside IF my pimples have already had the evil sucked out of them with a patch on the night before. If it just slap on a patch on a popped pimple and go out the resulting bulging white patch filled with pus becomes more of an eyesore. It also tends to get dislodged if I try to put it on dry skin and then do my skincare routine and THEN put on makeup, so I usually just do my skincare, then go over the pimple with cleansing toner, slap a patch on, and then continue on with my makeup routine. I also avoid putting on anything other than concealer directly on the patch because it ends up looking like a cakey mess otherwise. It also works with darker skintones, and is just as discrete on my NC20 as it is on my Indian friend's NW45.