What to Do When You Have Combination Skin
Is the skin on your face dry in some areas and oily in others? If so, you may have combination skin. Figuring out how to balance these two opposing skin types can seem a tad tricky at first, but when armed with the right info and products, balancing combination skin is actually a lot easier than you might think.
What Is Combination Skin?
Combination skin is recognised as having oily skin on some areas of your face and dry skin in other areas. Typically, the t-zone (forehead, nose, and chin) is more prone to oiliness, while the dry areas usually persist around the cheeks, jaw area, and along the hairline.
What Causes Combination Skin?
A variety of factors can contribute to combination skin, but often it comes down to the luck of the draw in terms of what you’ve inherited from your parents. Seasonal climate changes may also factor in, and the types of skincare products you’re using can absolutely exacerbate the condition of combination skin.
An overproduction of the skin’s oil (known as sebum) leads to an oily t-zone. When not addressed with regular cleansing and exfoliation, the sebum can linger in pores and mix with dead skin cells, which in turn, contributes to breakouts.
One of the major ways you might unknowingly make combination skin more of an issue is by using skincare products that contain harsh or irritating ingredients. This will inevitably dry out some areas of your face while stimulating oil production in other parts (especially around the nose) that are already oily.
Examples of skin-irritating formulas include:
- Toners formulated with skin-sensitising denatured or SD alcohol, menthol, and witch hazel
- Overly-abrasive scrubs. The tip is: if you can feel it scratching at your skin, then it’s a red flag
- Bar soaps and cleansers that leave skin uncomfortably tight and dry
- Any skincare product with a strong, wafting scent, whether the source of the fragrance is natural or synthetic.
Can Combination Skin Change To Normal Skin?
When you use the wrong skincare products, you may notice your skin drying out in some areas and oilier in others. As such, eliminating them from your skincare routine and making the appropriate substitutions to your routine will help get your combination skin back on the "normal” track.
By “normal”, we mean the dry areas will feel more hydrated and smoother and the oily areas will look as well as feel less greasy. If you have enlarged pores, you may also notice them returning to their normal size.
How To Take Care Of Combination Skin?
Addressing both excess oil and dryness can seem like a daunting task, but fret not. We’ve put together our top suggestions and skincare routine steps below for healthy combination skin.
1. Wash your face with a cleanser every day
Start with a gentle but effective water-soluble cleanser. It can be a creamy foaming face wash or gel cleanser. The goal is to effectively remove impurities, debris, and makeup without leaving the skin feeling tight, dry, or greasy.
If you need a bit of extra cleansing, you can consider using an emollient cleansing balm first to gently break down makeup and sunscreen, followed by a water-soluble cleanser to rinse all debris away.
2. Use a clay mask
Clay, as well as charcoal, have absorbent properties which can soak and trap excess oil on the skin’s surface as well as inside the pore. This allows the gunk in your pores to be easily washed off, which helps reduce the shiny look of oily areas on the face, especially the forehead.
When formulated with soothing and hydrating ingredients, clay masks can help address excess sebum while still hydrating skin. For combination skin types, apply an oil-absorbing clay face mask after cleansing affected areas.
3. Apply toner
Apply a hydrating, soothing non-irritating toner filled with a healthy amount of skin-replenishing ingredients and antioxidants. A well-formulated toner for combination skin really can help nourish dry skin and minimise oiliness at the same time. Furthermore, it won’t make the dry areas drier or the oily areas oilier.
We recommend you don’t skip this step as it's incredibly beneficial for people with combination skin.
4. Try exfoliating
Use a gentle, non-abrasive, leave-on BHA exfoliant. This is an optimal choice as it can gently but effectively exfoliate combination skin. A BHA exfoliant helps your skin shed dead cells normally without the use of abrasive methods (meaning no scrubs or stiff cleansing brushes), unclogs pores, reduces oiliness of the skin, and at the same time, gently smoothens rough, dry, flaky skin. All of these, thereby, revive a healthy glow.
You can experiment with different textures to see what feels best for your combination skin, but as a jumping-off point, most find a gel exfoliant or weightless liquid exfoliant ideal.
5. Use moisturizer
Moisturize and protect skin from sun damage. All skin types can benefit from a broad-spectrum sunscreen rated SPF 30 or greater and applied 365 days a year. This is the one daytime step that reduces the early signs of aging now, and into the future.
A feather-light formula is an ideal sunscreen for combination skin all over the face (and don’t forget to apply to the neck!). At Paula’s Choice Singapore, we formulate sunscreens with moisturizing agents to create multitasking products.
For instance, if your dry areas need more hydration than a multitasking formula can provide, apply another moisturizer or antioxidant serum to those areas. Then follow with your sunscreen of choice over that.
We also recommend people with combination skin type to use a nighttime moisturizer with a gel or serum-like texture that contains antioxidants, skin-replenishing, and skin-restoring ingredients. These are imperative to help calm skin, lessen excess oil on the skin’s surface, and improve dry areas, including around the eyes. For the dry areas, add another layer of hydrating booster serum or facial oil to relieve the dryness and give those areas extra nourishment and enriched hydration.
6. Watch your makeup ingredients
Combination skin can really throw your makeup routine in a loop. The formulas that work on your t-zone might not work on the borders of your face, and vice versa. To give your makeup the best chance of staying all day long and not become both oily and flakey, prime the dry areas of your face with a hydrating moisturizer made for makeup application and the oilier areas of your face with a mattifying primer.
When it comes to foundation, you can go the route of applying natural finishes, meaning a finish that doesn’t look matte or glowy. Remember to always set your t-zone with an oil-absorbing powder or powder foundation for even results.
Which Products Work With Combination Skin?
Focus on oil-absorbing or matte-finish formulas for the oily areas of your combination skin; go with more emollient-textured products over the dry areas.
For the oily areas, use the lighter weight formulas—products with a gel, thin lotion, or liquid texture. These types of textures layer well, so you can use them over the entire face. You would then only need to add an emollient facial oil, serum, or moisturizer over the dry areas, including around the eyes.
How To Deal With Extreme Combination Skin?
Those struggling with extreme combination skin experience an exceptionally oily T-zone, while the sides of the face are typically very dry and may also be flaky. For extreme combination skin, be extra careful to use oil-absorbing products just where needed, dabbing them on precisely. Apply emollient-rich products to the very dry areas, and be sure to blend away from the oily areas.
As for cleansers, a hydrating lotion face wash works well to clean skin without leaving skin tight or dry. For your daytime moisturizer with sunscreen, go for the lightest possible formula but apply a rich moisturizer or facial oil to the dry areas first.
Is Combination Skin Acne-Prone?
Combination skin can also be prone to acne. You may have more breakouts in the T-zone or all over the face, or not at all—this varies from person to person.
If you’re experiencing dehydrated, oily, acne-prone skin all at the same time, we have a separate guide to get you through it. Spoiler alert: salicylic acid, aka BHA, plays a major role in the fight against acne.
How Do I Know My Skin Type?
If you aren’t 100% sure what skin type you have, use a gentle cleanser to wash your face and then wait about 15 to 30 minutes to see how your skin behaves. If your skin starts experiencing dryness and feels tight, with no signs of oiliness, you have dry skin.
But, if your face takes on a shiny appearance with zero signs of dryness, you have oily skin.
On the other hand, if your T-zone starts looking oily but your cheeks and jaw area are feeling slightly to moderately dry, you likely have combination skin.
No dryness or oiliness? You’ve got “normal” or, more accurately phrased “neutral” skin. Learn more about the nuances of different skin types.
For more information, see our article When Should You Start a Skincare Routine, which walks you through the process of when and how to start caring for your skin.
Learn more about combination skin.
Shop Paula’s Choice combination skincare products today.
References for this information
Skin Research and Technology, 2005, pages 189-195
Journal of Dermatology & Cosmetology, April 2020, pages 42-44
Cold Spring Harbor Perspectives in Medicine, January 2015, pages 1-14
Journal of the Medical Sciences, 2001, pages 95-103
American Academy of Dermatology, Accessed February 2022, ePublication
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