Retinol is a form of vitamin A that has major benefits for your skin. Vitamin A is an antioxidant, which means it’s a member of a group of essential nutrients that your entire body needs to stay strong and healthy, especially as you age.
For your skin, antioxidants like retinol can be key ingredients in an anti-aging beauty regimen.
When included in your daily skincare routine, retinol can play a key role in reducing the appearance of wrinkles, fine lines, blemishes, and scarring left behind by breakouts.
For anyone looking to get a more refreshed, even, and youthful complexion, retinol is an ingredient that definitely deserves some attention!
Retinol vs. Retinoids: What’s the Difference?
Some forms of topical vitamin A are too strong to be available without getting a prescription from a doctor. These prescription-only forms of retinol are known as retinoids. Retinol, on the other hand, is available over-the-counter, meaning you don’t need to get a prescription from a doctor to get it.
For most skin concerns, retinol is enough to have a major positive impact.
If you are mainly dealing with wrinkles and other age-related issues, using products containing retinol should produce the results you are looking for – you shouldn’t have to use prescription-level vitamin A in the form of a retinoid.
However, if you are dealing with severe post-breakout scarring from cystic acne, use of a retinoid prescribed by a dermatologist can make a big difference for your skin.
If you’re not sure whether retinol or a retinoid is best for you, talk to your dermatologist. A skin professional can help you put together a game plan for taking the best possible care of your skin.
Skin Cream Basics
A cream is a type of skincare product that is made from a combination of water, oil, and ingredients like antioxidants and acids. The mixture of water and oil acts as a vessel to transport a cream’s main ingredients to your skin. This mixture makes the cream easy to spread on your face and gives it a pleasant, smooth texture.
You might be wondering what sets skin cream apart from lotion, gel, or other easy-to-spread skincare products. The main distinction between cream and other similar products is in texture.
Cream is typically made with a different ratio of water and oil, often using more water and less oil than lotion. The addition of more water makes skin creams slightly thinner than lotions.
In addition, lotion is often designed to be used on your body rather than on your face. The extra oil content in body lotion makes it ideal for use on often-dry parts of your body like your hands and elbows.
Cream, on the other hand, is typically formulated specifically for use on the sensitive, delicate skin on your face.
Why Use Retinol Cream?
Retinol cream can play a key role in an anti-aging skincare routine. Using the cream at night can help to reduce the appearance of wrinkles, lines, blemishes, and other skin issues that can arise with age.
As you get older, it’s completely normal to notice wrinkles showing up on your skin – but that doesn’t make it any easier. Dealing with wrinkles and minimizing their appearance can help you feel confident and keep you loving the way you look as you get older.
You can use retinol cream every night as a part of your PM skincare routine. Nightly use of the cream can leave your skin smoother, brighter, and clearer over time. That means you can keep feeling great about the way you look as you get older. Maintaining a youthful, refreshed look and feel for your skin is much easier when you have high-quality, all-natural ingredients like retinol on your side!
Retinol Cream Versus Serum
A cream isn’t the only way you can supply your skin with the benefits of retinol! You can also include retinol serum in your beauty regimen to allow for additional absorption of vitamin A.
Serums are very different from creams, but can contain the same highly beneficial ingredients. A serum is lightweight and often has the consistency of a thick liquid. There is typically no added oil in a serum, nor are additives put in to make it easier to spread.
Instead, when you use a serum, you’re getting a high concentration of the serum’s main ingredients – much higher of a concentration than you get from heavier products like cream, lotion, or gel.
Using retinol serum alongside retinol cream can be doubly beneficial for your skin, allowing for the wrinkle-fighting power of retinol to be even more available to your skin.
You don’t have to choose between retinol cream and serum – you can even use both together!
Just make sure to put serum and other lightweight products on before moving on to cream and other heavier products. That way, the heavier stuff will not inhibit your skin’s absorption of the lighter products in your beauty regimen, including serums.
Why goPure?
goPure’s Retinol Night Cream is unique for a few key reasons.
First, it’s incredibly soothing for your skin. While some retinol creams can leave your skin red, raw, and irritated after use, our signature formula includes soothing ingredients that will keep these side effects at bay.
goPure’s retinol facial cream combines its main ingredient with vitamins E and B, along with green tea. These added antioxidants add to the soothing, softening power of the cream, and help to keep redness and other unwanted side effects away.
Another key quality of GoPure’s retinol cream that sets it apart is the use of 100% pure retinol. Some products are made with a derivative of retinol, such as retinyl palmitate. Derivatives of pure retinol may not be as effective in dealing with skin problems as the ingredient is in its purest form.
With goPure, you always get the highest quality ingredients in their purest forms -- it’s in our name! That way, you can feel great about everything you are putting on your skin each day.
Finally, goPure’s retinol cream (and all of our products) are completely free of artificial dyes, fragrances, and any other unnecessary ingredients that have the potential to irritate your skin. Our retinol cream is also paraben-free, sulfate-free, and, of course, cruelty-free.
How Does Retinol Affect My Skin?
When you first get started with using a new product on your skin, it’s always a good idea to do a 24-hour patch test to see how your skin responds to something new. A patch test is quick and simple, and if everything goes well, you’ll be on your way to softer, smoother, refreshed skin in no time.
To perform a patch test, simply apply a little bit of retinol cream to a patch of skin on your arm. Then, after 24 hours, check to see if any irritation or redness has shown up where you applied the cream. If not, you are all set to start using the cream on your face!
If you have especially sensitive skin, you can start off using retinol cream a few nights per week and slowly work up to nightly use. Sensitive skin is sometimes more prone to be irritated by powerful ingredients like retinol, but that doesn’t mean you can’t use retinol cream if your skin is sensitive!
For anyone with sensitive skin, ingredients like retinol are not off limits, but you may need to proceed with a bit more care to avoid an uncomfortable adjustment period.
How To Use Retinol Cream
Retinol cream is one of the heavier products that you’ll have in your PM beauty regimen. That means it’s most effective when used after lighter products like cleanser, toner, exfoliator, and serums.
If you are using retinol serum alongside retinol cream, the serum will come immediately before the cream in the sequence of your beauty products.
When the time comes to put retinol cream on, you can apply a generous amount to your face, spreading it evenly to cover everywhere from your forehead to your neck. However, it’s best to avoid your eye area when using retinol. The sensitive skin around your eyes is always best treated with special care. If you’re looking for the perfect product to use around your eyes, goPure’s Eye Gel is the way to go!
Nightly use of retinol cream is simple, and it’s easy to get used to the process of putting it on. After a few weeks of consistently using the cream, you should start noticing your skin getting softer, smoother, and taking on a healthier look. Retinol cream takes time to work, but your patience will be rewarded with visible results!
goPure’s retinol cream works best when combined with other goPure Beauty formulas, including our signature retinol serum. You can also pair the cream and serum with our vitamin C cleanser, hydrating toner, glow-boosting eye gel, and more to maximize the anti-aging benefits for your skin!
Sources:
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF02850266
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1468-2494.2008.00479.x
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/09546630050517685
