The Best Natural Ingredients for Dry Skin

Dry skin — whether it’s hereditary, caused by the environment, or the result of some not-so-great skincare products — may seem like a problem with an easy fix, but that’s often not the case. You’ll want emollients and hydrating ingredients to replenish skin, but not something that’s too slick or greasy. As such, natural ingredients can be an amazing alternative for dry skin, but you need to know which ones to look for — and which to avoid.

Skin-Soothing Natural Ingredients

Nature has provided a wealth of options to help boost the skin and help it revert to a hydrated, smooth, and supple look and feel. You can choose from a multitude of natural ingredients, including plant oils, plant extracts, and antioxidant compounds that occur naturally in plants, such as matcha green tea and coffee. All these help any type of dry skin improve and defend itself against environmental aggressors.

But not all natural ingredients are great for dry skin. For example, essential oils might sound good for dry skin because they have the words “essential” and “oil” in their name, but they can also contain numerous volatile fragrance components that trigger the skin. As most people with dry skin know, aggravated skin makes dryness worse, not better.

Therefore, when searching for natural ingredients for dry skin, fragrance-free is always the best way to go. Non-fragrant plant oils, such as borage seed oil, argan oil, evening primrose oil, sunflower seed oil, and cranberry seed oil, are all amazing at soothing and revitalising dry skin. As a bonus, they all have antioxidant properties, which means they can defend your skin against the environmental irritants that can cause dry skin in the first place.

Plant butter is another choice ingredient to nourish and replenish dry skin. Seek out luxurious, rich butters like shea butter, cocoa butter, and jojoba butter. These provide a heavy-duty dose of emollient benefits and boost your skin’s ability to prevent moisture loss. Holding on to moisture is key to stopping the cycle of dry skin.

Last, but not least, there are a variety of skin-replenishing ingredients, such as ceramides, glycerin, cholesterol, and omega fatty acids, that can visibly strengthen and significantly soften dry skin so it looks revitalised rather than dull.

Of course, this doesn’t cover the entire spectrum of natural ingredients that are beneficial for dry skin — we merely identified those that research has shown to be particularly impressive. Using skincare products that contain any of these natural ingredients while avoiding naturally fragrant ingredients, is a great way to put you on the path to the smooth, supple skin you’ve always wanted!

One final note

We love great natural ingredients that are proven to benefit dry skin, but we’d be remiss if we didn’t also mention that they can be even better when combined with great synthetic ingredients. This mix of ingredients from the natural and synthetic worlds creates luxurious textures and silky-smooth applications that make the most of what natural ingredients can do for your skin.

Learn more about dehydrated skin and the best products for it.

Shop moisturizers, serums, sunscreens and other skin care for dehydrated and dry skin.

References for this information

International Journal of Dermatology, April 2017, ePublication
Biochimica et Biophysica Acta, March 2017, pages 1679–1689
Current Allergy and Asthma Reports, July 2016, page 51
Clinical Interventions in Aging, January 2015, pages 339–349
Journal of Clinical and Aesthetic Dermatology, June 2011, pages 45–55