Skincare

[stacyyy0927]

I currently use the drunk elephant retinol and I am curious about the new The ordinary Retinal is that a safe change and would my skin be able to handle the change ?

[catger]

I just switched from the Drunk Elephant 1% retinol one and am on week 2 of the Ordinary 0.2 retinal with no issues.  I use every second day at night. 

[WinglessOne]

@stacyyy0927  How long have you used Drunk Elephant A-Passioni™ Retinol Cream 1 oz/ 30 mL ? (Assuming that’s the DE retinol product you’re talking about; they make 2 different ones.) If your skin’s very used to 1% retinol, then The Ordinary Retinal 0.2% Emulsion Serum 0.5 oz / 15 ml might not irritate your skin. It’s hard to be certain because to my knowledge, there’s no one-to-one strength conversion chart for retinol vs. retinal. Sure, we know retinal works faster than retinol (requires one less conversion step than retinol to the active form of retinoic acid our bodies can actually use). But I don’t think any clinical studies have revealed a strength comparison. 

I used various retinol and granactive retinoid products at different strengths before switching to Avène RetrinAL 0.1 Intensive Cream a few years ago. That product contains 0.1% retinal and my reactive skin’s had no issues with daily use, aside from the one time I accidentally applied it to my undereyes before that skin was ready to tolerate it. Earlier this year I tested a full bottle of Youth To The People Retinal + Niacinamide Youth Serum 1 oz/ 30 mL (0.15% retinal) with no irritation, then went back to my usual Avène serum. This month I began testing The Ordinary’s 0.2% retinal. I started off using it every other night for 1.5 weeks, and now I’m using it each night. No issues so far, which is great because TO’s product costs far less per ounce than Avène’s and YTTP’s (and DE’s). 

That doesn’t mean you won’t have issues though. If you decide to try it, ease your skin into it like you (hopefully) did with the DE retinol: use it just a few times a week for a while to see how your skin tolerates it, and then increase usage. You might even want to use it just on one area of your face for a while as a patch test, rather than apply it to your whole face straight away.