What are the best skincare products for sensitive skin?Updated a year ago
When choosing skincare products for sensitive skin, it’s so important to start slow and keep it minimal. You might be tempted to try a lot of new products all at once, but we caution you to resist the urge. Keep it simple and gradual, only adding one new product at a time.
With that out of the way, here’s what to look for in the best products for sensitive skin.
Moisturizer for sensitive skin
Moisturizers are essential when you have sensitive skin. Infusing the skin with moisture helps to keep the skin barrier strong, which is important for preventing irritation from external forces.
If you want to keep this step in your routine simple and affordable, a simple, fragrance-free drugstore moisturizer from a brand like Vanicream will absolutely do the job. Simple moisturizing ingredients like glycerin, dimethicone, and petrolatum are effective at keeping water trapped in the skin with minimal risk of irritation. When your skin is particularly dehydrated or compromised, you’ll want thicker balms where these ingredients make up a higher percentage of the formula, to layer on immediately after a shower or after using lighter lotions.
On the other hand, it’s also useful to look for ingredients that’ll promote barrier restoration in the long term, especially if your skin is thin, prone to dryness, and easily compromised. These ingredients are a little more advanced. They include niacinamide, ceramides, cholesterol, and squalane. You can find them in products like Krave’s Barrier Repair Serum or Stratia’s Liquid Gold.
Sunscreen for sensitive skin
Sunscreen is a mandatory step in every skincare routine. For those with sensitive skin, sunscreen is essential since the damage from sun exposure can be much more disruptive to your already easily-irritated skin.
That said, finding sunscreen can be difficult since some SPF filters can be irritating. Oxybenzone is considered particularly allergenic, so those with sensitive skin may want to avoid it outright. However, reactions can be very individual, so consider patch-testing any new sunscreen you pick up.
Some sources recommend looking for mineral sunscreens when you have sensitive skin. However, because of their thickness and white cast, they can be unpleasant to use. They often don’t offer a satisfactory level of UVA protection. Because of that, we think it’d be easier to attempt to find a non-irritating sunscreen with chemical filters or a blend of mineral and chemical filters rather than a mineral one.
Face wash for sensitive skin
Washing your face is one of the most irritating aspects of your skincare routine. If you have sensitive skin, you need to be very careful about how you choose and use your cleansers.
Overwashing or using an overly harsh formula can seriously disrupt your skin barrier and lead to flare-ups.
For daily use, choose gentle cleansers that rely on oily ingredients to cleanse away sunscreen and makeup.
That said, if your skin is oily, you might be able to find effective gel or foaming cleansers. Look for formulas advertised as having a low pH between 4.5 to 5.5 (i.e. slightly acidic), which is the ideal level for the skin. Avoid formulas that mostly depend on a low molecular weight cleansing agent like sodium laureth sulfate. Instead, look for surfactant blends with ingredients like decyl glucoside, cocamidopropyl betaine, sodium cocoyl glutamate, and sodium lauroyl lactylate.
Ironically, a longer list of surfactants can actually correlate with a milder cleanser, since the chemicals bind together to become a larger cluster that’s less capable of penetrating the skin.
Skin-soothing products
When you have sensitive skin, it can be helpful to keep products on hand that’ll help calm redness and active inflammation when they rear their ugly head. The best products for the job are usually mists or serums with ingredients known to have a soothing effect or the ability to reduce redness.
Some of these ingredients are very well documented, and even approved as drugs in the US, like colloidal oatmeal. Others are newer and therefore less well-researched, but still promising. That includes centella asiatica and niacinamide (which also has the benefit of restoring the skin barrier).
One thing to watch out for is formulas laden with a lot of different plant extracts and essential oils. While some of these ingredients may show anti-inflammatory effects in vitro, it doesn’t necessarily correlate with them being a sensitive skin-friendly option. More often than not, they can actually irritate, making things worse.
Active serums for sensitive skin
With fragile or easily compromised skin, introducing new serums can be a little scary. Use slightly too much, and you run the risk of making your skin very angry. That said, using actives is still worth considering, especially when your skin is in a more stable place.
Nothing beats a vitamin C serum when it comes to preserving your youth and powering up your sunscreen. If you spend a lot of time outdoors or live in a polluted city, it’s worth introducing into your routine.
If you’re hoping to see a real transformation, vitamin A is the way to go. Retinoids can go a long way in thickening the lower layers of your skin, making it less fragile over time. Unfortunately, potent retinoids like prescription retinoic acid can also cause an inflammatory reaction that we believe may actually slow results.
We’ve developed our Enzyme-Active Retinol Serum with retinaldehyde, which is simultaneously the most potent and effective cosmetic retinoid while also being incredibly gentle and unlikely to irritate. Equal clinical performance (at least in the case of wrinkle reduction), tons of irritation difference.
Exfoliants for sensitive skin
Exfoliants help remove the top layers of rough, dead skin cells from the surface of the skin. They’re not always mandatory and are actually best avoided when your skin is especially sensitive. That said, if you notice flakiness and dead skin buildup, they can actually be very helpful, helping to remove those outer layers to smooth out the skin and increase its ability to take in moisturizer.
You’ll want to avoid physical scrubs, though. Those harsh abrasives are much likelier to cause trouble since they scratch the skin unevenly. Chemical exfoliants, on the other hand, can actually be a good choice when your skin isn’t experiencing any flare-ups.
Exfoliating acids like glycolic acid have been found to help thicken the lower layers of the epidermis, which can actually help make the skin more resistant to damage. If your skin is both sensitive and acne-prone, salicylic acid can be an excellent choice since it’s both pore-clarifying and soothing.
Finally, make sure to look for chemical exfoliants that are formulated to be gentle and that don’t contain ultra-high amounts of exfoliating acids. For example, our skin-renewing AHA Cleanser is made with reasonable 5% glycolic acid and 2% lactic acid. It also contains green tea and aloe vera, which help keep it mild and add a soothing touch.