How do facial serums, creams and lotions work?

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How do these products deliver results on your skin? How does the magic work that give improvements in your skin problem areas like aging skin and wrinkles?

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Mostly because they’re fat, and they also contain something that keeps your skin moisturized. A dry and non-fat skin looks wrinkly and cracked, gives off more flakes and provides less protection.

The fatty stuff makes your skin more elastic and shiny, and prevents evaporation of (some) moisture from your skin. The moisturizing stuff – as the name suggests – helps in moisturizing your skin, which is also good for elasticity. For that purpose, these creams and lotions also contain water, otherwise the moisturizing stuff has nothing to moisturize your skin with.

And then there’s some stuff to stabilize the cream, make it smell nice and sometimes a UV-filter or some coloring stuff (like browning cream).

The main difference between brands is the type of fat and moisturizer they use, and also the type of perfume usually. As it happens, the most effective of these don’t feel and smell nice, so people don’t want to use them (and therefore are, paradoxically, also the cheapest; on the other hand, you probably wouldn’t want to walk around smelling like white spirit). So they try different alternatives.