Hyaluronic Acid + Niacinamide: A Super Skin Combo
Everywhere you turn, there are new skin care ingredients.
But as impressive as many of those ingredients claim to be, you can’t beat the classics. Hyaluronic acid and niacinamide are powerhouse ingredients in their own right, but when used together, they can leave your skin more hydrated than ever before.
Here’s how each of them works separately and how they can be even more beneficial when combined in the right way.
What is hyaluronic acid?
Hyaluronic acid is a substance that the body naturally makes to help keep your joints moving smoothly. However, this slippery substance has also proven incredibly effective at supporting the skin!
Hyaluronic acid is categorized as a humectant, which means it can help the skin retain moisture. While it is part of the skin’s natural moisturizing factors (NMFs), we often don’t produce enough of it to get the desired results. This is where supplementation comes in!
Applying hyaluronic acid to the outside of the skin draws moisture from the middle layer of the skin (the dermis) into the top layer (the epidermis). Combined with the fact that hyaluronic acid can hold onto up to a thousand times its molecular weight in water, the results can be very impressive. Plus, once that water is in the epidermis, hyaluronic acid holds onto it for dear life.
The epidermis is the center of the skin’s hydration, for better or worse. Supporting and protecting it is crucial.
What is niacinamide?
Niacinamide is the medical term for a form of vitamin B3, which is required for the body to function properly and maintain healthy cells. The vitamin can be naturally found in many foods we enjoy — eggs, green vegetables, fish, meat and cereals. Milk is also a great source of natural niacinamide.
But how does the vitamin benefit the skin, specifically? Like many vitamins, niacinamide offers a wide range of skin-related benefits — supporting a healthy balance of oil, minimizing the visibility of dark spots and brightening the skin, among others.
Niacinamide can help you achieve those benefits by supporting a healthy amount of lipids in the outermost level of the epidermis, known as the stratum corneum. You may have heard this referred to as the moisture or skin barrier. Ceramides, cholesterol and fatty acids are crucial for keeping that barrier strong and healthy, so any extra help it can get is appreciated.
Niacinamide’s ability to protect and support the skin barrier makes it an excellent addition to sunscreen (like our Clear Defense SPF and Sheer Defense SPF). Sunscreen is arguably the most important element of any skin care routine. Chronic sun exposure can lead to free radicals in the body, which can speed up the aging process and even cause dangerous health conditions.
How well do hyaluronic acid and niacinamide work together?
Obviously, there is plenty of benefit to using either hyaluronic acid or niacinamide, but how well do the two work together? It turns out that these ingredients make an excellent team, working perfectly to complement each other’s hydration benefits.
Essentially, using hyaluronic acid and niacinamide together promotes hydration from dual angles. Niacinamide helps moisturize and support your skin, and hyaluronic acid helps lock that moisture in.
Who can benefit from using hyaluronic acid and niacinamide?
Hyaluronic acid and niacinamide are natural products, which makes them much easier to incorporate into anyone’s skin care routine. However, they are especially beneficial for people with specific skin concerns, like excess oil production. But genuinely, anyone can benefit from using either one of these ingredients — on their own or in combination.
However, knowing your skin type (or, at least, having a general idea of how your skin behaves) can give you a massive leg up on finding the best products to take care of it. It’s much easier to work with your skin than against it.
How can I incorporate hyaluronic acid and niacinamide into my skin care routine?
If you’re ready to add this dynamic duo to your existing skin care routine, we have just the products to help!
One of our favorite hyaluronic acid and niacinamide products is our Youth Serum. If you thought it was a powerhouse before, wait until you try our newest formulation — with four times the amount of niacinamide! When used on clean skin, the serum can help minimize the look of visible signs of aging.
If you need focused hydration in the eye area, we didn’t leave you out. Eye Sculpt is also packed full of hyaluronic acid and niacinamide, delivering a one-two punch to fine lines, puffiness and dark circles. Apply it before the rest of your serums.
You don’t have to use hyaluronic acid and niacinamide in the same product (or even at the same time) for them to be effective, either. They work well in tandem, as well as apart, both morning and night.
However, no matter how you choose to incorporate these ingredients into your routine, it’s vital to start by cleansing your skin. Even the best skin care ingredient can’t be beneficial if it has to work through a layer of dirt and debris.
A good cleanser (which may even include hyaluronic acid and niacinamide) helps clear away all that debris so that your other products can act directly on the skin and penetrate even deeper into the pores.
To wrap things up...
If you haven’t added hyaluronic acid and niacinamide into your skin care routine, what are you waiting for? This combination of powerhouse ingredients is excellent at hydrating the skin from both the inside and the outside.
When combined with a supportive cleanser and moisturizer and supplemented with skin care treatments that enhance your results even further, you’ll have healthy, glowing skin in no time.
SOURCES:
Hyaluronic acid: A key molecule in skin aging | PubMed
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