Face Oil Before or After Moisturiser, Honestly: Where It Goes, and Whether You Need One

Most answers to this question come from brands that sell both face oils and moisturisers. This one does too: we make three face oils. So here is the version with the sources attached: where the oil goes and why, what is known about oil and sunscreen (very little), whether you can skip the cream, whether oils clog pores, and exactly what is in ours.

If you only want the order for your own routine, the table in the next section has it.

Where face oil goes in your routine

The usual rule is thinnest to thickest, and water-based before oil-based. In practice that puts a face oil at the end of your evening routine, after serums and moisturiser. In the morning the last step belongs to sunscreen, so the oil has to come before it, and the simplest way to do that is to mix a drop into your moisturiser.

Why the order matters, and why it is only a rule of thumb

Each layer does a different job. Moisturisers usually combine three kinds of ingredient:

• Humectants, such as glycerin and hyaluronic acid, draw water into the outer layer of skin and hold it there.
• Emollients fill the gaps between skin cells, so the surface feels softer and smoother.
• Occlusives form a film on top that slows water evaporating out of the skin.

A face oil is mostly an emollient with some occlusive effect. A 2017 review of plant oils describes how they can act as a protective film that lets skin retain moisture, which shows up as lower water loss. The same review notes that almond, jojoba, soybean and avocado oils mostly stay on the surface rather than soaking deep into the skin. What an oil does not have is water, or anything that draws water in.

That gives two practical reasons to put oil last. A water-based serum or gel spreads badly over a film of oil and tends to sit on top of it. And an oil on top of your moisturiser helps slow the water in it from evaporating. Both are formulation logic. We could not find a trial that compared the two orders with face oils specifically, so treat the order as good sense, not as proven science.

Face oil and sunscreen: what we know and what we don’t

This is the question that matters most, and it is the one with the least evidence.

What we do know is that a sunscreen protects according to how evenly its film lies on the skin. In a 2014 laboratory study on pig skin, sunscreens with exactly the same UV filters gave different SPF values depending on the base they were in and on how they were applied: spreading them for longer and pressing harder both lowered the SPF. Where the film is thinner, protection is lower.

That is the reason to keep oil away from your sunscreen. An oil applied on top can dissolve and move the film as you spread it. A sunscreen applied over a layer of oil that is still wet can slide about instead of settling evenly. And oil mixed into the sunscreen itself simply dilutes it. We could not find a published study that measured the SPF of a sunscreen worn over or under a face oil, so this is reasoning, not data. It all points the same way, though.

• Use oil in the morning only if your skin needs it, and mix one drop into your moisturiser rather than adding a separate layer.
• Give it a few minutes to settle before sunscreen.
• Apply sunscreen last, generously, and pat rather than rub it in.
• Never mix oil into sunscreen.

One more reason to keep sunscreen as its own step: in a 2019 study, 84 people each applied an SPF 30 sunscreen and an SPF moisturiser. With the moisturiser they missed 16.6% of the face on average, against 11.1% with the sunscreen, and the gap was largest around the eyelids. A moisturiser with SPF in it is not a substitute for a sunscreen.

Can a face oil replace your moisturiser?

Sometimes, but not for most people. An oil softens the surface and slows water loss. It does not add water, and it contains none of the humectants that pull water into the skin. That makes the answer depend on what your skin is short of.

• Dry skin, which is short of oil and feels rough or flaky, may be comfortable with an oil alone at night, pressed onto skin that is still damp from cleansing.
• Dehydrated skin, which is short of water and feels tight, sometimes while still looking shiny, needs humectants. Oil alone will not fix it.
• Most skin does best with a moisturiser as the base and oil, if any, on top.

Do face oils clog pores?

Some can, in some people. But the lists you will find online, often with a comedogenic score from 0 to 5 for each oil, are far less reliable than they look.

The idea that cosmetics cause acne was named “acne cosmetica” in a 1972 paper. Most of the ingredient ratings that followed came from the rabbit ear assay, in which a substance is applied to the inside of a rabbit’s ear and the blocked pores are counted. Even the authors of a 1984 list built this way called it “not an ideal animal model but the best we have”. A rabbit’s ear is not a human face, and the test looks at a raw ingredient, not at the finished product it ends up in.

In 2006, researchers tested finished cosmetic products on the backs of six people who form comedones easily. Their conclusion was blunt: finished products using comedogenic ingredients are not necessarily comedogenic. The amount of an ingredient, and what it is mixed with, matter.

What does seem to matter is which oil you use:

• Olive oil is the cautionary tale. In a 2013 study, adults who applied six drops of olive oil to a forearm twice a day showed a significant drop in the integrity of the skin’s outer layer, and mild redness, within four weeks. Sunflower seed oil, tested on the other forearm, preserved the barrier and improved hydration.
• Linoleic acid and oleic acid. A 2018 review concluded that oils with more linoleic acid relative to oleic acid have better barrier-repair potential, and that oleic acid can irritate. In a 1998 trial in people with mild acne, linoleic acid applied to the skin reduced the size of the tiny blocked pores that precede spots by almost 25% in a month.
• Jojoba is not really an oil. It is a liquid wax made of wax esters, the same class of lipid that human sebum contains alongside triglycerides and squalene. It is also very stable and slow to go rancid. It is the first ingredient in all three of our face oils.

If your skin breaks out easily, the honest advice is to test it yourself: use one or two drops on one area of your face for two to four weeks and watch for new small bumps. If they appear, stop. A rating on a list cannot predict your skin.

Face oil for oily skin: yes or no?

You do not need one. If your skin is oily but feels tight after cleansing, a light humectant gel is usually the better first fix, and one or two drops of oil at night can be added if the tightness stays.

You may read that applying oil “tricks” the skin into producing less of its own. We could not find evidence for that. Use an oil on oily skin because it feels better, not because it will turn the taps down.

How to apply a face oil

1. Use two to four drops for the whole face. More just sits on the surface.
2. Warm them between your fingertips.
3. Press the oil onto your face rather than dragging it across the skin.
4. In the evening, make it the last step. On very dry skin it spreads more easily over skin that is still slightly damp.
5. In the morning, mix one drop into your moisturiser instead, then finish with sunscreen.
6. Keep it away from the eyes, and give a new oil about four weeks before you judge it.

What is in ours

None of our three face oils is fragrance-free, and two of them contain nut oils. Both points are below, product by product.

Nourishing Facial Oil

The Nourishing Facial Oil has 21 ingredients, with jojoba first. Light emollients (decyl cocoate, and undecane with tridecane) keep it from feeling heavy. Around them are argan, avocado, sweet almond, apricot kernel, borage, evening primrose, plum and blueberry seed oils, extracts of tomato, sea buckthorn and cloudberry, and vitamin E. Borage and evening primrose are the oils known for their omega-6 fatty acids. It is listed for dry and mature skin.

It contains sweet almond and apricot kernel oils, so skip it if you have a nut allergy, and fragrance (parfum, with linalool, limonene, citronellol and geraniol from natural essential oils).

All-In-One Facial Oil

The All-In-One Facial Oil is the richer blend: ten plant oils, with jojoba and sweet almond first, then sea buckthorn fruit oil, avocado, apricot kernel, evening primrose, plum seed, oat kernel, raspberry seed and olive oil, plus rosehip and tomato extracts and vitamin E. It is also listed for dry and mature skin.

Three things to know. It contains sweet almond and apricot kernel oils. It contains olive oil; that comes after the fragrance in the ingredient list, so it is a minor part of the formula, but given the 2013 study we would rather you knew. And it is the more heavily scented of the two, with bergamot, bitter orange, lemon and spearmint oils and the allergens declared with them.

Natural Retinol Alternative Oil Serum

The Natural Retinol Alternative Oil Serum is a face oil that also carries an active ingredient: bakuchiol, seventh in the list, in jojoba, evening primrose and rosehip oils with strawberry, raspberry and blueberry seed oils. It has no nut oils and is vegan. It is fragranced, with geranium oil. The bakuchiol percentage is not published, and the trial behind bakuchiol used a cream; our retinol alternatives guide covers what that trial did and did not show.

How to choose

• Dry or tight skin that wants a final layer at night: the Nourishing Facial Oil.
• Very dry skin that likes a richer oil, and no problem with scent: the All-In-One Facial Oil.
• You want a retinol alternative and already like oils: the bakuchiol oil serum, used as your oil step.
• Nut allergy: neither of the first two. The bakuchiol oil contains no nut oils.
• Fragrance bothers your skin: none of the three. The fragrance-free edit lists our products with no parfum.

Where to start

If your skin feels dry or tight by the evening, start with the Nourishing Facial Oil as the last step of your night routine, and a single drop in your moisturiser on mornings when you need it. The All-In-One Facial Oil is the richer option, and the full range is in face oils.

Whatever you use, finish the morning with sunscreen. The tinted SPF 50 stick is ours. And if your skin feels tight and shiny at the same time, oil is not the fix: that is usually dehydration, and our skin barrier guide explains what helps.