Here I’m gonna be sharing with you my best 5 ingredients for oily skin as well as some skin care products with these ingredients.
Oily skin is something a lot of people deal with and it tends to be more obvious in the summer months, especially if you live in a humid climate.
It’s a common myth or misconception that oiliness is due to the skin care products that you use. To be clear, moisturizers, sunscreens, they don’t make you oilier.
Oil production is largely governed by hormonal influences. For example, in women, the time of ovulation, progesterone levels are higher and that makes you oilier or shinier. Men tend to have oilier skin than women as a result of the androgens, testosterone, things like that.
You can have oilier skin as a result of your genetics. Some people just have larger oil glands, more prominent pores.
So if you’re looking for a sunscreen or a moisturizer that won’t make you oily, stop looking. They don’t make you oily. It’s your hormones. It’s just the nature of your skin.
These products that I’m sharing with you in this article and these ingredients can help reduce that burden of oiliness and help degrease you.
Table of Contents
Clay
Ingredient number one is clay. It can be bentonite clay or kaolin clay.
Clay is found in masks and clay is very absorbent. It helps wick up oil from the surface of the skin and from within the pore. That can reduce the appearance of shininess.
Excess oil on the surface of the skin is what clogs your pores and can lead to blackheads and whiteheads as well as acne lesions.
Doing a clay mask can help reduce overall the amount of oil on the surface of the skin and from within the pore. That will help you not look as shiny.
It will help in controlling breakouts potentially and it will help your skin care products go on better.
To be clear, however, the clay is not going to impact the rate of oil that comes out of your oil glands. It’s just gonna mop up some of the excess.
I am a huge fan of the Cetaphil clay mask. The reason I like this product so much is that it has clay but it’s also very moisturizing.
A downside of the clay masks is that they can be drying and people with oily skin sometimes think that they need to dry out their skin and it’s actually not true at all.
Oiliness does not necessarily equate to moisturized skin in fact some people have oily skin and they also have a tendency towards dryness. So don’t put the two together in the same box.
Oily and moisturized are not the same thing!
I really like the Cetaphil mask for that reason. It’s not overly drying. You can try introducing it into your routine maybe a few days a week, but if you tolerate it, you ultimately could do it on a daily basis.
I also am a huge fan of the inky Inkey list kaolin mask.
It is very moisturizing. If you’re somebody who finds that sunscreen makes you look shiny and you feel as though it’s making you oilier (it’s not making you oilier, sunscreens tend to reflect light and really make everyone look shiny) if you have oily skin, that’s going to be amplified.
Try doing a clay clay mask first thing in the morning to help remove some of that excess oil from the surface of your skin, then rinse it off and then apply your sunscreen. It will go on more evenly and not look as shiny.
Niacinamide
Ingredient number two is niacinamide.
Niacinamide is a B vitamin. It has tons of benefits for the skin beyond just helping with oiliness. It is anti-inflammatory and it can also help in improving the moisture barrier.
So for those of you who have oily skin but you also have a tendency towards dry skin, niacinamide is a good ingredient to incorporate.
Niacinamide also can reduce the burden of oxidative stress in the skin, which ultimately can break down that excess oil on your skin.
Because of its anti-inflammatory properties, there are studies examining its efficacy for the oily skin condition acne. Interestingly, using a four percent niacinamide moisturizer daily in people with acne, caused an overall reduction in acne severity comparable to using the prescription one percent clindamycin.
That’s great because unlike clindamycin, niacinamide is not an antibiotic so you don’t have to worry about bacterial resistance developing.
Another study showed that using a two percent niacinamide moisturizer daily reduced the output of oil onto the skin as well as the overall volume of oil on the skin.
These studies suggest that niacinamide is obviously beneficial.
The niacinamide market is saturated. Every brand is trying to grab your attention for their niacinamide serum.
You don’t need a special niacinamide serum and a high percentage of niacinamide is not necessarily better. In fact in many cases it can end up being too irritating.
I’m a huge fan of CeraVe PM. This is a facial moisturizer with niacinamide, It works quite well. It’s very oily skin friendly. I highly suggest it.
It also has ceramides which will address any skin barrier defects you may have and help with dry skin.
Again, you don’t need a high percentage and you can find a reasonable percentage strength in most moisturizers. Just look at your moisturizer and if it has niacinamide in it, great. It can help out your cause as far as the oiliness.
Green Tea
Ingredient number three is green tea, specifically the polyphenols in green tea. They’re very anti-inflammatory, they can reduce oxidative stress and there’s some data that green tea in emulsion form can reduce oiliness and pore size, likely by inhibiting some of the hormonal signaling.
We do have some studies on actual people showing benefit in oiliness using a green tea emulsion. Specifically a three percent green tea emulsion for eight weeks showed an overall reduction in sebum in people. Another one using a green tea emulsion for 60 days showed an improvement in oiliness.
A good product is Isntree Green Tea Fresh Emulsion. I don’t know the percentage strength, but it’s a very nice lightweight moisturizer. You can derive the benefit of the green tea polyphenols using it.
Green tea is also helpful for reducing redness and helping with hyperpigmentation. It’s got many benefits similar to niacinamide and you can use it multiple times a day. It can be layered along with other ingredients. You don’t have to worry about it causing irritation, it’s very well tolerated.
Another product I want to draw your attention to you is Replenix age restore brightening moisturizer. I really like Replenix. They have a lot of great sunscreens with green tea polyphenols and they have this age restore brightening moisturizer that you might want to check out.
Not only does it have green tea polyphenols, but it also has niacinamide in it, so you get both of those ingredients in this.
The other nice thing about green tea is that it can also help in reducing oxidative stress and free radicals from environmental stressors, like sun exposure, pollution.
Because both green tea and niacinamide are antioxidants, you can use them up to twice a day, but I also suggest using them first thing in the morning, apply them to the skin, allow them to absorb fully and then apply your sunscreen on over. And if you want to do a clay mask before that, fine. Then just apply either the green tea or the niacinamide or both and allow those to absorb fully and then apply your sunscreen.
The advantage here is that because niacinamide and green tea are antioxidants, they can help reduce the burden of oxidative stress that comes from environmental stressors like sun exposure. The reason that’s important is that for people with oily skin, the breakdown of their oils can contribute to flares of acne and skin problems. But you also can use these at night time.
Salicylic Acid
Number four is an exfoliant that is really good for people with oily skin and that is salicylic acid or BHA.
salicylic acid is a chemical exfoliant that loves oil and it focuses in the oily surfaces of the skin. It can penetrate into the oily areas very well, especially within the pore. It exfoliates the pore and it reduces oiliness. It clears it out.
The other nice thing about salicylic acid is that it can help reduce the burden of acne lesions, but it also can help reduce hyperpigmentation.
I am a huge fan of Paula’s Choice BHA toner.
Two percent BHA can be used up to twice a day if you tolerate it, but I suggest incorporating it into your routine very slowly, a few days or nights a week in the beginning, and then bumping up to daily use. See how you tolerate, it can be a little drying, so introduce it slowly. If you tolerate it well, then it can be used up to twice a day.
So this is a good exfoliant for people with oily skin.
Salicylic acid gets into the pore nicely and what it does is it breaks up the bonds between skin cells that are stuck together, so that they can dislodge and exfoliate out. It also helps clear out some of the oil, so it can help with clogging of the pores that ends up happening if you’ve got too much oil on the surface of the skin.
Retinol
Last but not least we have good old topical vitamin A, retinoid or retinol.
This can help actually in suppressing oil production at the level of that hormone signaling and it can help shrink the oil gland.
A good product is Differin gel. It really can help with the oiliness and especially if you are prone to clog pores, blackheads, whiteheads and acne.
This is a great product that helps in controlling skin cell turnover, so it helps clear out the pore. Retinoids actually can help shrink the pore.
These are the best ingredients for oily skin.
Rebecca is a licensed aesthetician and certified laser technician with almost 15 years experience in the dermatology. Her life-long passion is making people look good and happy.