What’s Combination Skin?

You start the morning with a shine-free complexion, but by midday oil appears on your forehead and nose. Your cheeks sometimes feel normal, sometimes tight, dry, or even flaky. You’re no stranger to a pesky imperfections and large pores. In the end, when it comes to your skin, you have it all—aka combination skin. Combination skin is characterized by having an oily t-zone (forehead, nose, and chin) and often drier areas of skin elsewhere. So, when curating a skincare routine, it’s important to listen to your skin. Read on for our tips on a combination skin routine that will make you feel good in your skin.

How to address combination skin

Addressing combination skin is tricky because you’re dealing with multiple skin concerns. Using harsh products to help reduce oil and imperfections will dry out your skin, especially patches where you’re experiencing dryness. Using heavy, moisturizing products to nourish dryness will lead to an even oilier t-zone and perhaps clogged pores. So how do you approach combination skin? Just like life—it’s all about balance and resilience.

When your skin is balanced, its oil-to-water ratio is achieved, allowing it to function properly with a strong skin barrier. This targets multiple concerns so your skin will feel good and behave more predictably. Think: not too oily, not too dry, but just right.

Improving resilience is another way to address combination skin. This involves helping its ability to bounce back against everyday life stressors like lack of sleep, poor diet, stress, and seasonal changes. These life stressors can wreak havoc on skin, causing dullness, dryness, rough skin texture, visible pores and excess oil—concerns that those with combination skin are already prone to. The best way to improve skin’s resilience is to ensure your skin barrier is strong.

Building your fresh skincare routine

For those with combination skin, fresh has got you. Here is a lineup of the best skincare products to incorporate into your routine for smooth, glowing (and predictable) skin!

Step 1: Soy pH-Balancing Hydrating Face Wash

Good skin starts with clean skin. Get your routine going with an effective face wash like Soy Face Cleanser. This soy cleanser is perfect for combination skin because it maintains skin’s pH, gently removes makeup and impurities, and boosts hydration. It’s formulated with amino acid-rich soy proteins, aloe vera, cucumber extract, and borage seed oil to retain moisture, reduce redness, and support skin's barrier. The result? A clear, healthy look. No wonder it’s one of our best sellers!

Step 2: Rose & Hyaluronic Acid Deep Hydration Toner

Next up, a toner to complete the cleansing stage. They’re designed to remove excess impurities and restore skin’s balance. Rose Deep Hydration Facial Toner is a non-stripping formula that clears skin of impurities, refines the look of pores, and hydrates. This best-selling alcohol free toner has triple the rose power thanks to toning rose fruit extract, strengthening damask rose extract and nourishing rose oil. Swipe on to strengthen skin’s barrier and reveal a soft, supple look.

Step 3: Tea Elixir Skin Resilience Activating Serum

For the serum step, we want to focus on strengthening skin’s barrier and improving its resilience. Combination skin, meet your new best friend, Tea Elixir Serum. After just one use, it improves skin elasticity and boosts glow while contributing to a 31% stronger skin barrier* and reducing the look of wrinkles by 15%**. The result is a smooth, radiant complexion.

The secret behind this do-it-all serum is APT Technology™. Exclusive to fresh, it’s rich in resilience-boosting phytocompounds to resist and diminish early signs of aging. It’s other hardworking ingredients include niacinamide to refine pores and even tone, 5kDA hyaluronic acid to deeply hydrate, and ceramide III to strengthen skin’s barrier. It addresses dryness, dullness, enlarged pores, visible lines and wrinkles—aka a dream for those with combination skin.

Step 4: Rose & Hyaluronic Acid Deep Hydration Emulsion

This final step is a moisturizer. For combination skin, it’s important to choose a moisturizer that keeps skin hydrated while also controlling oil. Rose Deep Hydration Balancing Emulsion does just that. It’s proven to perfectly balance oil-water hydration for deep but weightless moisture. This fast-absorbing, milky formula includes damask rose extract to attract and retain moisture while strengthening the skin barrier , low molecular weight hyaluronic acid to instantly hydrate the deeper layers of the epidermis, and yarrow extract to help refine texture and pores. With this light face moisturizer, you’ll see more even texture, reduced visible pores, and smoother skin.

Remember, think balance and resilience when choosing the best skincare products for your combination complexion and you’ll be feeling good in your skin in no time.

Still undecided on a routine? Discover more fresh products made for combination skin.