Best vitamin c serum please

[dahabaya]

I tried the Peter Thomas Roth but it “crumbles” under moisturizer and sunscreen. A Sephora specialist recommended Murad advance active radiance serum but haven’t tried it yet. Any suggestions?

[JooshanOoi]

Skin ceuticals aox 15 / ce ferulic or drunk elephant c firma

[Sreitz]

Drunk elephants- didn’t make me break out at all and typically vitamin c clogs my pores

[WinglessOne]

@dahabaya 

I’m also looking for a good vitamin C serum. I currently use Youth To The People Superfood Firm and Brighten Vitamin C Serum 1 oz/ 30 mL and it’s okay, but I’m not seeing much in terms of results. Also, it comes in terrible packaging (clear glass bottle) for vitamin C: although its star ingredient, magnesium ascorbyl phosphate, is a more stable form of vitamin C than ascorbic acid, it should still be in an opaque container. I moved mine to a better bottle. Magnesium ascorbyl phosphate isn’t as potent as ascorbic acid, which is probably why I haven’t been wowed by results in the few months I’ve used this product. But I want to get through the entire bottle before I switch to something else. 

That serum’s not terrible, don’t get me wrong. It contains other antioxidants, a peptide, and other good stuff. And it soaks into my skin very quickly. I only recently began to notice some pilling, and I think I’ve narrowed that problem down to this serum not playing nice with either my eye cream or one of my sunscreens.

Are you giving your PTR serum enough (maybe at least 2 minutes) time to soak into your skin before layering anything else over it? That could help resolve your pilling issue. Also, you might need to use less of it. I find that overusing the YTTP vitamin C serum always causes pilling—even before I apply moisturizer over it. 

Sorry I’m not being more helpful here... I hope you find a good solution!

[dahabaya]

Thank you for your reply 😊 I liked the PTR because of the packaging and the ingredients actually thd ascorbate is number 2 on the list plus it has ferulic acid and vit. E. plus others. And it worked just fine texture and brightness wise. I always wanted to go back to it

[PenelopeBT]

Hi @dahabaya,

Great question! My favorite vitamin c serum is the Sunday Riley C.E.O. 15% Vitamin C Brightening Serum 1 oz/ 30 mL

What I love about this serum is that it's light, sinks right into my skin and has a nice, floral scent to it. I can apply moisturizer and sunscreen beautifully on top of it, too!

Stay Gorgeous,

Penelope

[quspork]

@dahabaya The Olehenriksen Truth Serum is a good starter vitamin C serum depending on what you want to use it for. If you're willing to try Korean skincare, Tiam C Source has done amazing things for my post-acne scarring.

[pocketvenus]

@dahabayaI like pure+simple's formula, it's also relatively affordable.

[sprocketta]

I started using the Ole Henriksen Truth Serum about a month ago. My skin is definitely brighter and someone literally commented that on Saturday. The orange scent makes it really refreshing. I really like it and recommend it. That being said, I am going to try the new Farmacy cherry bright vitamin c serum and try that. I'd like to see the difference between products. But I can definitely say the Truth Serum is a good product. I pair it with the C rush moisturizer from the same line.

[creamcrow]

I think ole henriksen products are terrible. They're cheap and gimmicky

[creamcrow]

\"Vitamin C in the skin is normally transported from the bloodstream. Transport proteinsspecific for ascorbic acid are found on cells in alllayers of the skin (7). Keratinocytes have a high capacity for vitamin C transport, possibly to compensate for limited vascularization of the epidermis (7, 8). Oral supplementation with vitamin C effectivelyincreases vitamin C levels in the skin (9, 10). 💎💎However, when plasma vitamin C levels are saturated, skin vitamin C concentrations no longer increase.💎💎 Optimum skin concentrations of the vitamin are not yetknown.\" People might want to do their research before taking products at face value. There is limited research on vitamin c👍I've read a lot about it because I'm obsessed with skin care and I hate wasting anything. There's no need to get upset at me. 🙂🌺💚

[dahabaya]

Thank you for your reply 😊 I like what you said and will give it a try. Just need to figure out how much to include in my diet to actually benefit my skin

[creamcrow]

It's best to get vitamin c from the diet. If a person is getting an adequate amount internally then no more can be absorbed topically. Therefore if you're eating well there's no need to add additional because it's not going to absorb and you're just throwing your money away. Also keep in mind that there have been no studies on humans for the efficacy of vitamin c, the studies were only performed on animals. Makes me wonder how many of these products are absolutely useless, especially given how volatile vitamin c is in the production process. With that being said I use Dermalogica's C12 Pure Bright serum. Supposedly products that contain vitamin c help keep the other active ingredients stabilized. It is $100 but keep in mind your getting 1.7 ounces of product and it lasts awhile.

[WinglessOne]

I’m also very curious about this now, because it contradicts what doctors have told me and what I’ve read in articles and studies myself—especially since there have been many studies on vitamin C’s effect on human skin. I might add this topic (specifically the absorption of oral vs. penetration of topical vitamin C: which one best benefits skin, and can one cancel out the other) to my “ask my docs” list, and I encourage others to do the same. 

Meanwhile @creamcrow , if you find the full article/study title and author(s) you’re referencing, please let me know so I can search for it and read it. (We can’t post outside links on BIC.) I’m always in knowledge-seeking mode and I don’t take disagreements personally (well, unless someone’s blatantly rude about it). Disagreements are learning opportunities for all parties involved and sometimes spark more questions/research avenues. 

Also, I’ll quote a related article: Telang PS. Vitamin C in dermatology. Indian Dermatol Online J. 2013;4(2):143–146. doi:10.4103/2229-5178.110593. 

I picked this one because it includes a brief summary of info from other studies (cited), which is kinda handy. Bold emphasis added by me. 

“L-ascorbic acid (LAA) is the chemically active form of Vit. C. In nature, Vit. C is found in equal parts as LAA and D-ascorbic acid. These are essentially isomeric molecules and are mutually interchangeable.[4] However, only LAA is biologically active and thus useful in medical practice.[2] The absorption of Vit. C in the gut is limited by an active transport mechanism and hence a finite amount of the drug is absorbed despite high oral dosage.[3] Furthermore, bioavailability of Vit. C in the skin is inadequate when it is administered orally.[1,2] The use of topical ascorbic acid is therefore favored in the practice of dermatology.[5]” 

References: 

Spoiler

1. Talakoub L, Neuhaus IM, Yu SS. Cosmeceuticals. In: Alam M, Gladstone HB, Tung RC, editors. Cosmetic dermatology. Vol. 1. Requisites in Dermatology. 1st ed. Gurgaon: Saunders Elsevier; 2009. pp. 13–4. 

2. Traikovich SS. Use of Topical Ascorbic acid and its effects on Photo damaged skin topography. Arch Otorhinol Head Neck Surg. 1999;125:1091–8. 

3. Farris PK. Cosmetical Vitamins: Vitamin C. In: Draelos ZD, Dover JS, Alam M, editors. Cosmeceuticals. Procedures in Cosmetic Dermatology. 2nd ed. New York: Saunders Elsevier; 2009. pp. 51–6. 

5. Matsuda S, Shibayama H, Hisama M, Ohtsuki M, Iwaki M. Inhibitory effects of novel ascorbic derivative VCP-IS-2Na on melanogenesis. Chem Pharm Bull. 2008;56:292–7. 

[quspork]

There actually have been numerous studies regarding topical vitamin C serum and human skin, @creamcrow . Lab Muffin and Kind of Stephen have great blogs about the science of skincare and both highly recommend topical vitamin c for a variety of uses including helping with discoloration. Both blogs are great resources as they almost always cite the actual studies they pull from.

[creamcrow]

I checked out lab muffin and when I click on their "studies" some of the links are broken and lead to pages that say "error" and "null". The studies were less than a page long and are vague. They talk about picture evidence and say "we took pictures" but there weren't any.? Kind of Stephan has no scientic data from what I saw and correct me if im wrong but a measley 300 followers on ig. I'm not trying to be judgmental but these are not proper examples.

[WinglessOne]

@creamcrow  For any broken Lab Muffin reference links, did you try searching for them yourself? Most are probably freefly available at NCBI and will come up in a simple google search. At NCBI, you might get the 1-page abstract as your search result. There’s a dropdown menu where you can select more detailed views of the study/article. 🙂 EDIT: Hmm, looks like the full study views aren’t available in many cases. I could swear that used to be an option at NCBI. Abstracts are helpful when you just want key info instead of all the nitty gritty details, but it’d be nice if the full studies/reports/articles were easily available, too. Eh, this just adds another layer to info-gathering. 

[quspork]

That's funny, @creamcrow I had no problems with the links to any of the studies I clicked on in both blogs today. 🤷 I'm not sure where you seemed to be coming across that issue. And not that I think Instagram followers are necessarily a good measure of anything, but Kind of Stephen does have almost 40K- for the record.

[snoflakefaerie]

Hey @creamcrow  you've said multiple times on the forum that you can get enough vitamin C from your diet, but everything I've read states the fraction of vitamin C that is bioavailable in skin cells from diet alone is not enough to provide enough antioxidant protection and there is topical absorption from serums that is beneficial. Do you have a source where you're getting that information? Thanks!

[creamcrow]

"Vitamin C in the skin is normally transported from the bloodstream. Transport proteinsspecific for ascorbic acid are found on cells in all layers of the skin (7). Keratinocytes have a high capacity for vitamin C transport, possibly to compensate for limited vascularization of the epidermis (7, 8). Oral supplementation with vitamin C effectively increases vitamin C levels in the skin (9, 10). 👍💎However, when plasma vitamin C levels are saturated, skin vitamin C concentrations no longer increase. 💎Optimum skin concentrations of the vitamin are not yet known." lmao. I marked the findings with a diamond😘😄

[creamcrow]

I first learned of these facts from a chemist on yt. I was very surprised because she was explaining things I'd never heard of and I wanted to fact check her, especially given the amount of money I spend on skincare. From there I went on to read studies I found online. Turned out she was 100 percent correct. I don't have a link, I read a lot, but if I happen to stumble across it I'll keep you in mind👍