Skincare companies are selling you on the idea that higher active ingredient percentages are superior and better than their competitor’s products. But it’s simply not always the case. 

“If it’s not in the first five ingredients, it doesn’t work” – this is not true.  

Proper science is needed to be done on ingredients, for us to know how they benefit the skin, like clinical research and studies. These are expensive to conduct, so it’s mostly the big guys like L’Oréal, Proctor and Gamble, Estée Lauder etc. 

Anyway, the studies on ingredients are done at a particular percentage, for example, niacinamide is studied at around 4% showing it’s a fantastic ingredient for the skin, so why are some companies putting 20% in their formulations, do we know if that’s better? Or just irritating our skin?  

Benxalproxided is shown to be equally as effective at 2.5% compared to 10% but with again less irritation. 

Low on the ingredient list? Still effective? 

The general thought is that if it’s all the way at the bottom on the ingredient list, then it’s pointless, not true. 

Our beloved retinol is a perfect example of this, a considerable amount of studies have been done on retinol, and it’s shown to be effective at 0.5%. The results do not change once you increase the retinol strengthen (only irritation) the difference is, the time it takes to see results may be faster. 

Another ingredient Vitamin C (Ascorbic Acid) studies have used creams containing 3% to 10%, and we know research has shown it can be an excellent ingredient for the skin when in a stable formulation. On my skincare shelf, I have a Vitamin C by the Inkey List (no flack on them I love their stuff) has a 30% stable L Ascorbic Acid, well above amount used in research, trust me I can tell that stuff burns! 

So all this talk and marketing about which product has the highest amount of … ingredient, is it important? It’s always a good idea, to little research on a product or brand to trust them but often formula is key, you can’t judge products based on one single ingredient. 

The best way to get results from ingredients is time and compliancy, vitamin C takes 6 – 12 weeks to results, niacinamide 2-12 weeks depending on the reason you’re using it.

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