What are the best skincare products for dry Skin?Updated a year ago
The best skincare routine for dry skin is pretty simple, but for it to work, you have to choose products that will adequately nourish and hydrate your skin. Here are the things we’d recommend keeping in mind!
Moisturizers for dry skin
For day-to-day use, it’s useful to choose a medium-thickness lotion with barrier-replenishing ingredients like niacinamide, squalane, or ceramides. Our Hyaluronic Acid & Niacinamide Hydration Cream is an excellent choice.
At times when your skin feels especially dry or dehydrated, look for rich, thick moisturizing formulas with occlusives like dimethicone or petrolatum. You don’t have to choose an expensive product, either. There are plenty of excellent creams with thick textures that aren’t expensive.
The best time to use a rich moisturizer is after you’ve soaked the skin in water. By immersing your skin in water for a few minutes, you help it absorb a ton of moisture, but once you get out of the water, that moisture starts to evaporate very quickly. Applying a thick, occlusive cream within a few minutes will immediately seal that water into the skin, which is particularly useful if you’re dehydration-prone.
Cleanser for dry skin
The best thing you can do when you have dry skin is avoid over-cleansing. Even a lot of gentle cleansers will remove some of your skin’s lipids, potentially disrupting your skin barrier and causing dehydration. For example, we think that cleansing in the morning is best avoided.
That said, you’ll still need to cleanse your skin on nights when you’ve worn makeup or heavy sunscreens. Choose cream or oil-based cleansers that will do a wonderful job breaking down debris while also infusing your skin with moisture. There are a lot of affordable drugstore and French pharmacy cleansers that can do a phenomenal job.
Exfoliant for dry skin
A few times a week, your skin barrier may benefit from exfoliation with AHAs like glycolic and lactic acid. These exfoliating acids have humectant effects, which means they help the skin retain moisture, and they’ve also been found to help thin the top layer of rough dead skin while thickening the lower layers of the epidermis, making the skin heartier over time.
To save time, we developed our AHA cleanser as a gentle, easy-to-rinse exfoliant that cleanses gently while also removing dead skin. You can use it as needed, and even leave it on for up to 5 minutes when you want a very thorough peeling treatment.
Serums for dry skin
Serums are your chance to really treat your skin, so choose serums based on your specific concerns.
Most serums are water-based, so while they can help infuse the skin with some hydration, they’re not as effective as creams and lotions at moisturizing the skin.
You can’t go wrong with treatments or serums with retinaldehyde for general skin rejuvenation and anti-aging benefits. Vitamin C is another popular option - it’s an antioxidant so it’s excellent for preserving youthfulness, protecting the skin, giving it a brightening boost, and amping up sunscreen.
Aside from there, you can also find skin-soothing serums, serums with other types of antioxidants, or even serums with exfoliating acids. Avoid using too many treatments at once, though. At best, layering serums one on top of the other will cause dilution, but at worst, you run the risk of irritating your skin from too many active ingredients.
Sunscreens for dry skin
Sunscreen is a must-have in the daytime, protecting your skin from the extremely destructive damage of the sun. A rich sunscreen can even double as a moisturizer! Beauty of Joseon’s Relief Sun is a recent favorite of ours thanks to its rich, nourishing formula.
If you’re already using a moisturizer in the daytime, you might prefer a light sunscreen like Biore’s Watery Essence, that will layer nicely and feel great over your moisturizer. Just make sure that your moisturizer sinks in thoroughly before applying sunscreen.