Mixing skin care ingredients? Better to keep them separate!

While you may prefer to apply all of your favorite skin care products to your skin at the same time, not all ingredients are suitable for mixing. 

But which ingredients should be distinguished in skin care? We've picked and listed them for you! 

Vitamin C + Niacinamide: Popular vitamin C is great but unfortunately doesn't mix with all ingredients. For example, caution is recommended when combined with nicotinamide (also known as vitamin B3). 

Our Vitamin C Serum contains a combination of Vitamin C and Niacinamide, but in just the right ratio. So it's not a problem, they just reinforce each other. 

If you mix a product containing niacinamide with a serum, the ratio will become unbalanced and there is a risk of adverse consequences, such as: B. Acne. If two (or more) separate products in your skin care routine contain these ingredients, wait at least 10 minutes between applications. 

Vitamin C + AHAS and BHAS: Vitamin C is a difficult element to work with because it doesn’t work well with AHAs and BHAs. You should especially consider acids like salicylic and lactic acid, which should never be mixed with vitamin C. 

Mixing these ingredients together can disrupt your skin’s pH balance. This can cause your skin to become more sensitive or make your skin problems worse, which is definitely not what we want. 

For example, you could use a vitamin C serum in the morning and a product containing AHAs in the evening. This way you can use both ingredients without mixing them. 

Vitamin C + Retinol: The combination of vitamin C and retinol also keeps it in better shape. These are active ingredients. Therefore, mixing the two ingredients can actually cause greater irritation. 

Vitamin C is a skin-protecting ingredient, so it’s best to use it in the morning. Retinol, on the other hand, is activated by sunlight. Therefore, it is most convenient to use this product before going to bed. 

Retinol + AHAS and BHAS: We’ve already discussed these ingredients in combination with vitamin C, but retinol and AHAs and BHAs should not be used together. Both ingredients deeply exfoliate and are great on their own, but together they are too much. 

This can lead to dry and irritated skin. For daytime use, make sure to pair the two (separately, of course). After using a peel, it’s important to protect your skin from aggressors like the sun and blue light. 

Niacinamide + AHAS and BHAS: We want to avoid combining niacinamide with AHAs and BHAs. This reduces the effectiveness of both ingredients and can even cause redness on the skin. This is mainly caused by the products having conflicting pH levels. 

Niacinamide has a pH of about 5-7, and acids like AHA and BHA have a pH of about 3-4. Therefore, at lower pH levels, the effectiveness of the ingredient is lost. Regardless, these products are great for acne-prone or aging skin. So you can definitely continue to use them, but not at the same time. 

Oil+water: Finally, something that most of us know, namely; mixing oil and water on your skin is not a good idea. We all know what happens when you put oil in a glass of water: it floats. Basically the same process happens on the skin. 

Therefore, it is better to choose to use oil-based products or water-based products. If your favorite products are only oil and water, it's best to use water-based products first and oil-based products second. This prevents the product from leaving an oily layer on your skin after using it.