How Often Should You Moisturize Your Face?

Applying a face lotion or hydrating cream is an essential step in any skincare routine. But like flossing your teeth, it's possible to moisturize too often or not often enough.

How often should I moisturize my face? You're not the first person to wonder this—or type it into Google. We're here to clear the air.

Keep reading to learn why moisturizing matters for skin health, how much moisturizer you should use, and how to know if you're over- or under-doing it.

Why Moisturizing Is Essential for Healthy Skin

You know you should moisturize—but why, exactly? It's crucial for daily hydration and skin barrier protection, plus you get anti-aging benefits.

• Daily skin hydration. Applying a cream or lotion to your face, neck, and décolletage helps these areas stay hydrated, plump, and supple, preventing them from becoming dry or flakey.¹
• Skin barrier protection. Moisturizing also helps protect and strengthen the skin barrier. Sometimes called the moisture barrier or acid mantle, these outer layers of your skin help lock in healthy substances, keep out things that might be harmful, and balance natural moisture levels.²
• Anti-aging benefits. Dehydrated skin is more likely to show and form fine lines and wrinkles, so moisturizing can help it stay smooth, bouncy, and taut. By keeping your complexion hydrated and fortifying your skin barrier, a moisture cream can prevent other signs of aging, like crepiness, loss of fullness, and uneven skin tone.³

Factors That Affect How Often You Should Moisturize

Now that you know why this skincare step is vital, let's discuss how often you should do it. Generally speaking, most people should moisturize twice a day as part of their morning and evening routines.

However, individual needs can vary. Certain factors might affect how often you should apply a face moisturizer, like:

• Skin type
• Environmental conditions
• Lifestyle

Here's what to know.

How Often to Moisturize for Dry Skin

Looking for skincare tips for dry skin? If you have very dry skin, moisturizing once a day might not cut it. Using a topical moisturizing product twice daily should be enough, but you may want to use a richer, more emollient formula—at least as a night moisturizer. These products will help to hydrate the skin overnight and have your skin feeling refreshed in the morning.

Sometimes called barrier creams, emollient moisturizers containing natural oils, plant butters (like shea butter), or esters can help treat dehydrated, scaly, or flaky skin and prevent moisture loss.³ And if you have combination skin (dry in some areas, oily in others), moisturizing will help balance out your hydration levels.

How Often to Moisturize for Oily Skin or Acne-Prone Skin

Is moisturizer necessary if you have really oily or acne-prone skin? Yes, ideally twice a day. Daily moisturization is recommended for all skin types, even those that run greasier or are prone to pimples. For the best results, use about a nickel-sized amount of moisturizer, adjusting based on your skin’s needs and the product's consistency.

According to the American Academy of Dermatology Association, dry skin will naturally produce more oil. So by avoiding topical moisturizing products, you could actually be encouraging your skin to become greasier. As a result, the extra oil could clog your pores and lead to more breakouts.⁵

Also, certain acne treatments can cause dryness and irritated skin, so moisturizing is critical for combating these effects. The key is to use a lightweight, non-comedogenic formula that’s free of pore-clogging ingredients⁵. Additionally, incorporating a skin flooding routine—layering multiple hydrating products—can help to deeply hydrate the skin and maintain a balanced complexion without overloading it.

Adjusting Your Routine for Changing Weather or Lifestyle Factors

You might feel like you need to moisturize more often in the cold, dry winter or less often in the hot, humid summer. But twice daily moisturization is still usually the sweet spot.

Instead of applying a moisturizer less frequently or more often, you might reach for a different formula better suited for the season. For instance, you can use an emollient-rich moisture cream in the chilly months and a lighter-weight gel moisturizer (like something with hyaluronic acid) when temperatures heat up. When it comes to our favorite summer and winter skincare tips, what changes is more the products, rather than the frequency. 

Having said that, if your skin still feels particularly dry due to weather conditions or because you're dehydrated, it's fine to moisturize again mid-day. But before that, it would be wise to drink more water.

And you should apply moisturizer every time after showering or washing your face—especially with hot water, which can be extra-drying.

Also, in the summer, sunscreen can double as a facial moisturizer. You can apply it as many times a day as necessary (at least every 90 minutes when you're spending time in direct sunlight).

How to Tell If You're Over-Moisturizing or Under-Moisturizing

It's possible to overdo it with moisturizing—whether you're applying a product too often or using too much of it.

Signs of over-moisturizing: 

• Clogged pores
• A greasy feel on the skin
• Shiny-looking skin (rather than dewy)

And you can definitely under-moisturize.

Signs of under-moisturizing:

• A tight or dry feeling
• Flakiness, scaling, or peeling
• Rough, uneven texture
• Visible dry patches
• Increased fine lines or crepiness
• A dull complexion from a buildup of dead skin cells

If you know what to look for and pay attention to how your skin behaves, it should be pretty clear when more or less moisture is necessary.

Finding the Right Balance for Your Skin

How often should I moisturize my face? Twice a day will probably suffice but check with a dermatologist for personalized advice if this doesn't seem to work for you or you have specific skin concerns.

Choosing the right products to moisturize with is just as important as knowing how often to use them. Our HYDRAGLOW™ plant stem cell cream is a great option for all skin types, even sensitive skin, and it pairs particularly well with our GOLDENHOUR watermelon facial oil.

To explore more options, check out our line of non-comedogenic skincare products.

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