Skincare for Acne & Blemishes

Three steps, kept up daily, beat six steps you abandon in a fortnight.

A cleanser that suits your skin, one active treatment and a light moisturiser. SkinCeuticals Blemish + Age Defense Serum, Image Skincare Clear Cell Restoring Serum and Caudalie Vinopure Blemish Control Salicylic Serum are all sensible first treatments.

Add SPF in the morning. Nothing else, for at least six weeks. Changing three things at once means you never learn which one helped.

Match it to what you are seeing.

• Blackheads, congestion and blocked pores: salicylic acid, which gets into the pore itself
• Red inflamed spots: benzoyl peroxide or azelaic acid
• Redness and marks left behind: niacinamide or azelaic acid
• Recurring breakouts and texture: a retinoid, which is the one that changes things over months rather than days

Products here include Medik8 Press & Clear and Obagi CLENZIderm M.D. Pore Therapy for salicylic acid, Medicube Azelaic Acid Exosome Shot 7500 for azelaic acid and Melumé Skinscience Waterfree Niacinamide Galactomyces Serum for niacinamide.

No. This is the most common mistake we see.

Stripping skin dry does not stop oil. It usually prompts more of it, and it wrecks the barrier so the actives you are using start to sting.

Use a light one. Image Skincare Clear Cell Mattifying Moisturiser, Caudalie Vinopure Moisturizing Mattifying Fluid and Dermalogica Breakout Biotic Moisturiser are all designed for oily skin. There is a lightweight moisturisers shelf in the menu above.

If you have started a retinoid or an exfoliating acid, this is probably purging. Those ingredients speed up cell turnover, so congestion that was already forming comes to the surface sooner. It shows up where you normally break out and it settles within about six to eight weeks.

If the spots are somewhere you do not usually get them, or your skin is itchy, tight or stinging, that is irritation or a reaction, not purging. Stop and let it calm down.

Purging is worth sitting through. Irritation is not.

Be clear about which kind you have, because it changes the answer.

Flat brown or red marks are pigment and they do fade. Niacinamide, azelaic acid, vitamin C and a retinoid all help, and daily SPF matters more than any of them because sunlight keeps darkening them.

Indented or raised scars are a change in the skin's structure. No cream will fill those in. That is in-clinic territory, so it is worth an honest conversation with a professional rather than working through bottles.

If you have deep painful lumps under the skin, if breakouts are leaving scars or if six months of consistent skincare has not shifted it, go and see a GP or a dermatologist.

Prescription treatment works on acne that skincare cannot reach, and waiting it out while scarring forms is the thing people regret.

Nothing on this page is a substitute for that. Good skincare works alongside it and keeps skin comfortable through treatment.