How to Winterize Your Skincare Routine

Winterizing a routine sounds like a shopping trip and mostly is not. The changes that matter are applying more of the moisturizer you already own, applying it more often, cutting back on the things that strip, and adding moisture to the air you sleep in. There is one purchase genuinely worth making if your current cream is not rich enough, and one you should not make: swapping to a heavier sunscreen or dropping it entirely because the sun feels weaker. This page is the swap list, in the order the changes are worth making, with the reasoning attached to each.

For why winter does this at all, see does cold weather damage your skin barrier. For the broader season-by-season view, see adjusting your ceramide routine for the seasons, and the ranked winter picks are in best ceramide moisturizers for winter.

Change 1: apply more, more often

The cheapest change and the most effective. If you use a ceramide cream twice a day in summer, use it twice a day in winter with a heavier hand, and add a third application on the areas that suffer — cheeks, nose, the backs of hands. Most people under-apply moisturizer year round and dramatically under-apply it in January. Before buying anything richer, try using twice as much of what you have.

Change 2: move to a richer texture where it counts

If a lotion is not holding through the day, a cream will. This is the one purchase worth making, and it does not need to be an expensive one — the big drugstore tubs are the richest formats on the market per dollar. A sensible structure is a lighter formula in the morning under sunscreen and a genuinely rich one at night. Our drugstore dry-skin routine is exactly that shape.

Change 3: make washing gentler

• Shorter, cooler showers. Winter is when this slips most and costs most.
• A non-foaming, fragrance-free cleanser, and consider skipping the morning wash entirely.
• Moisturize within a minute of washing, on damp skin, every time.
• Check your body wash — it is a common and overlooked culprit, covered in does your body wash damage your skin barrier.

Change 4: ease off the actives

A retinoid or acid schedule that your skin tolerated in July can be too much in January, because the barrier is already under load from the weather. Dropping from three retinol nights to two for the season is not a defeat; it is the reason you will still be using it in March. If you are already flaking and stinging, stop the actives entirely for a fortnight and follow how to repair your skin barrier. What can share a night is mapped in our ingredient pairing chart.

Change 5: add moisture to the air

The environmental half of the problem, and the one a moisturizer cannot solve. A bedroom humidifier addresses the hours you spend in heated air overnight; whether it helps and how much is covered in do humidifiers help dry skin, and the level to aim for is in the best humidity level for skin.

What not to change

Do not drop sunscreen. Winter sun is weaker, not absent, and snow reflects a significant amount of it. Do not start exfoliating harderbecause you can see flakes — winter flaking is usually a depleted barrier, and sanding it makes the next round worse. Do not replace your whole routine at once. If something starts stinging in December you want to know which change caused it.

The honest limit

These are cosmetic adjustments for a dry season. If your skin cracks, bleeds, itches badly or stays inflamed through a gentle winter routine, that is worth a doctor's or dermatologist's opinion. Winter aggravates conditions that already exist, and a richer cream is not a treatment for one.