Nothing beats a facial oil for an instant boost of radiance and plumpness. While a traditional moisturizer or face serum penetrates your skin, allowing it to absorb all of those potent ingredients, the best face oils act as occlusives. They create a protective barrier between your skin and the outside world, preventing moisture loss and allowing your skin to remain hydrated. “The main job of a face oil is to seal everything in and replenish the lipid content in the skin,” says Elizabeth Grace Hand, a New York-based aesthetician and Stalle Studios founder. “Face oils don’t necessarily add hydration to the skin, but they can help lock in all the moisture and powerful actives that you do get from a serum or moisturizer and keep environmental aggressors and irritants out.”
While anyone can benefit from a facial oil at the end of their skin care routine, the oil you use will be heavily influenced by your skin type and goals. To assist you in finding the best face oil for your most dewy look yet, our editors and testing collective tested 44 top-rated face oils individually, taking into account a wide range of skin types and concerns. Discover our winners below, and get Hand’s advice on what to look for when shopping for your skin type.
Why We Love It: Kora Organics’ face oil is packed with antioxidants and fatty acids (such as noni extract, rosehip oil, and sea buckthorn oil), and it truly soothes and brightens skin, leaving it with the most beautiful, luminous glow. It felt extremely lightweight on our tester Leslie’s combination skin while still keeping it soft and supple. Aside from moisturizing and brightening the skin, this oil will plump, even out the texture and tone, and reduce sun damage and scarring.
Worth noting: Because of its nourishing, organic ingredients, the oil is extremely moisturizing, but it is also extremely light. The nongreasy formula and lack of residue make it ideal for all skin types.
Why We Love It: What’s the secret to silky skin? Cocoa butter is commonly used in body butters due to its super moisturizing properties. Palmer’s skin therapy oil contains a key ingredient that not only smells amazing but also transforms the skin by intensely nourishing, smoothing fine lines and wrinkles, brightening complexion, and treating dark spots. While the oil has a slightly matte finish, it still provides deep moisture to the skin, all the way to the epidermal layer. It even feels light and comfortable on our extremely dry skin, rejuvenating it and making it feel silky to the touch.
It’s worth noting that the coconut, sesame, and apricot oils, as well as cocoa butter, are comedogenic, which means they’re not suitable for blemish-prone skin.
Why We Love It: Burt’s Bees is well-known for its lip scrubs, but its skin care products are equally impressive—and vastly underappreciated. With a blend of jojoba, rosehip, and evening primrose oils, this Burt’s Bees facial oil contains all of the necessary ingredients for revealing a healthy-looking complexion; it penetrates the skin to deeply hydrate and combat early signs of aging such as fine lines and wrinkles.
Worth noting: While the product keeps skin hydrated throughout the day, it leaves a slight greasy residue after application. Absorption also took longer than anticipated.
