Why would anyone want to use their hand lotion or body moisturizer on their face you may ask. Well, out of convenience is my guess. Like my husband, who used the Sukin Hydrating Body Lotion I passed him and applied it all over, including his face! And the result? Clogged pores and a mini eruption of pimples. In fact, he didn’t even realized the reason until I questioned him.
Body lotions are richer than face moisturizers
I had to explain to him that there is a big difference between facial and body moisturizers even if their texture seem similar. First, the skin condition between our face and our body is different with the skin on our hands and body typically drier than our face. Hence, the body lotion only needs to hydrate the dry skin and are thus formulated to be richer. I haven’t seen any body lotion that states that it is “non-comedogenic” although you see a lot of this on creams and moisturizers for the face, which means it won’t clog your pores.
Some ingredients can clog pores
Even if the ingredients used are the same, the concentration could be different. For example, if you compare the ingredients of Sukin Hydrating Body Lotion and Sukin Facial Moisturizer, they look almost similar but some of their order are different. The concentration of shea butter and cocoa butter are higher for the body lotion since they’re listed first. And cocoa butter has been widely rated as having a fairly high propensity to clog pores.
Sukin Hydrating Body Lotion Ingredients: purified water, an organic blend of aloe vera, nettle, burdock and horsetail, sesame oil, cetyl alcohol (vegetable), ceteareth-20 (vegetable), glycerin (vegetable), shea butter, cocoa butter, jojoba oil, rosehip oil, avocado oil, wheat germ oil, vitamin E, sodium hydroxymethylglycinate (suttocide), grapeseed extract, tangerine essential oil, mandarin oil, lavender oil, vanilla extract.
Sukin Facial Moisturiser Ingredients: purified water, an organic blend of aloe vera, nettle, burdock and horsetail, sesame oil, palm kernel alcohol (vegetable), ceteareth-20 (vegetable), glycerin (vegetable), vitamin E, avocado oil, jojoba oil, cocoa butter, rosehip oil, shea butter, wheat germ oil, tangerine essential oil, mandarin oil, sodium hydroxymethylglycinate (suttocide), citric acid, grapefruit seed extract, lavender, vanilla extract.
So you can apply your facial moisturizer on your body but you should never apply your body lotion on your face. At least that’s a lesson my husband learnt the hard way.
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One of my friend’s mum use J&J body lotion as facial moisturizer. She admitted her mum’s skin is very good but did not comment if her mum broke out from it. Anyway, my friend has flawless skin which I don’t have, so I don’t dare to try. May be her family has good gene.
nicole: Matured skin tends to be drier so perhaps that’s why she can take the body lotion. But I wouldn’t dare to venture to try…
Body lotion on face? Definitely a big no-no.
Hand cream on face, an even bigger NO.
MisSmall: Can you imagine using body butter?
oops! i did it twice! out of desperation i used hand cream on my face for emergency rescue.
prettybeautiful: Haha…I know what you mean. I tried using body wash on my face before too! But better not too…your sunscreen or sunblock can probably double up as a moisturizer if you’re using it.
Woah body butter on face? Bye bye face! Tee hee hee!
I did this recently too =x. I ran out of my loccitane face cream and decided, well, why not use the hand cream and body lotion? I ended up with a more greasy look (though still somewhat moist) but I broke out like crazy! And I feel like it might have stripped my skin a little. I won’t be doing this anymore.
Big opps: If was L’Occitane’s that you used, it’s definitely too rich for your face.
can i use dove beauty body moisturizer for face
asdad: I haven’t seen the moisturizer but I wouldn’t recommend. Generally, if it feels very rich, then it’s probably not too right for your face unless yours is extremely dry.
I would not dare to as I have very oily skin! My friend used body sunscreen on her face when we went to Sentosa & she broke out like mad. T_T
Tara: Yeah, normally what’s specific for the body has ingredients that are too rich for the face. Unless we have very dry skin, it is really not recommended to even try.
I used my Aveeno body lotion on my face, and now I have tiny bumps on my face! I’m so glad I read this article, if I didn’t I’d still be using body lotion on my face, and I’d get breakouts!
The molecules of the oils within the body lotion are definitely too large for the skin on your face. I’m glad you’ve stopped using it.
I don’t know if there is a difference between lotions that are made with purify water and lotions made with plain water. Would they have the same effect? Does anybody know?
Purified water is definitely “cleaner” for our skin and more preferable than just plain water that isn’t filtered. But who knows if they really use purified water as claimed.
Hmm…are you 56 or 34? In your other comment bearing the same name, email and ip address, you said you’re 56 and suddenly, you’re younger by 22 years old?
If body lotion was suitable to be used on a face, nobody would bother to buy facial moisturizer as it cost a lot more. Anyone with half a brain knows this.
Facial moisturizers are especially formulated for the face.
Neither should body lotion but used as a hand cream. Body lotion isn’t rich enough.
Then again, stay away from hand creams that contain too much glycerin. All they do is put an invisible glove on your hand. If you want to moisturize your hands, buy a cream that can actually penetrate the skin. Anything under $5 is junk.
Thanks for this! I’m currently shopping around for facial cleansers/lotions and I want to use the Burt’s Bees line because I’ve heard so many good things about it.
YES! but it depends on the lotion… Most body lotions will clog your pores but some wont and a few will actually help to unclog your pores. Its really easy to find them, just read the back of the bottle and it will specifically say if it doesn’t clog pores and/or will help to unclog them (look for the term “non-comedogenic” which means ‘will not clog pores’). From my own experience, I can recommend the new NutriSkin Lotions from Dial (won’t clog pores but won’t help to unclog them; WalMart- 3oz bottle is $2 and 12oz bottle is $4) and the Peaches& Cream moisturizer from Kiss My Face (won’t clog pores and will help to unclog them; WalMart- I’ve seen it stocked a few times in the clearance section of the beauty/lotion area and the 4oz bottle is only $2, Walgreens always has it but their 4oz bottle is $5 and 16oz $11, you can also order it online from kissmyface.com). I hope this is helpful… At least now you wont have to waste money on over-priced face moisturizers!
That’s very interesting but unfortunately, we don”t have these brands here. But it’s good that you’ve found some suitable for your face and they’re really affordable.
great points- also (as a manufacturer) i use quite different essential oils in my body blends to the face and also a different %.
I have recently started using facial moisturiser and my skin is soft but I’m starting to see pimples. I’m using vaseline face wash and moisturiser. May this be a bad product for my face, even I was body lotion on my face and it worked okay?
The ingredients might be clogging your pores resulting in your breakout. Stop and see what happens.