Top 10 Niacinamide Benefits for Your Skin and Body
When it comes to choosing skincare products, it can be difficult to make sense of all of the different ingredients and products out there. It often feels like you need to be a board-certified dermatologist to figure out how to address your skincare concerns! While we’re not knocking a visit to a professional, the best way to get a handle on all of the products out there is to get to know the ingredients used within them.
“Niacinamide is a multi-tasking ingredient in topical products, but the benefits don’t end there!”
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Shani Darden, Esthetician
Niacinamide is a common component in many skincare products, ranging from cleansers to serums and everything in between. But what does niacinamide actually do for your skin and for your body? Let’s talk it out.
What Is Niacinamide?
Niacinamide, also known as nicotinamide, is a form of vitamin B3, a nutrient that’s essential for healthy skin.
You may also hear niacinamide sometimes referred to as niacin — these are just two different types of vitamin B3. If you take a niacin supplement, however, your body can create niacinamide from it.
What Are the Benefits of Niacinamide?
Unlike other active ingredients, niacinamide doesn’t have very many side effects associated with it, if any. This means that it’s a great ingredient for all skin types. Even those of you with sensitive skin can experience all of the skin benefits that niacinamide has to offer! So, let’s talk about some of the amazing effects of niacinamide.
1. Supports a Healthy Skin Barrier
Your skin barrier is the outermost layer of your skin. It’s also known as your epidermal barrier, lipid barrier, or moisture barrier. It’s incredibly important because it’s responsible for keeping moisture and nutrients in your skin — and keeping bad bacteria and other impurities out. A compromised moisture barrier doesn’t just wreak havoc on your skin — it can also be harmful to your overall health.
Niacinamide can help grow your lipid barrier overall, which makes it easier for your skin to retain moisture throughout the day. This makes it the perfect addition to an eye cream intended to moisturize the sensitive skin around your eyes.
Our Intensive Eye Renewal Cream provides epic hydration with a combination of niacinamide, ceramides, and squalane. Shea butter and cucumber extract help to soothe and calm your skin, while Silk Tree Extract helps to promote a firming and lifting around your eye area. Many eye creams promise results without having the ingredients to back up their claims — but this eye cream isn’t one of them.
2. Soothes Red or Irritated Skin
Niacinamide is also thought to help address irritation. Applying it topically may help ease redness, blotchiness and irritation that may be getting in the way of your even skin tone. It’s even effective when it comes to specific skin conditions like rosacea that may leave you with stubborn flares of redness.
Of course, if you haven’t already done so and you think you might have an underlying skin condition, it’s worth stopping by the dermatologist to make sure there isn’t an additional issue standing between you and clear, even skin.
3. Promotes an Even Skin Tone
Niacinamide doesn’t just combat redness — it’s also shown an ability to address dark spots and pigmentation issues. With consistent use, it has a brightening effect on your skin, which can help address any problem areas when it comes to the evenness of your complexion.
4. Minimizes the Appearance of Pores
While overall, the size of your pores is determined by genetics, you can help reduce the appearance of your pores by ensuring that your pores are clean and your skin texture is smooth, hydrated, and even.
Using our Sake Toning Essence has niacinamide in its formulation to help address enlarged pores or other textural issues after your cleansing step. An essence isn’t the same as a toner, but it takes a similar place in your routine. With softening, brightening sake, and rosa canina fruit extract to address excess oil, niacinamide completes this trio to leave you with smoother, more even skin.
5. Helps Protect Against Visible Signs of Sun Damage
Niacinamide has shown the ability to support healthy skin cells thanks to its antioxidant content. Free radicals can be created by a wide variety of environmental factors, including UV rays, and antioxidants can help maintain your skin cell health even in the presence of free radicals.
Applying a niacinamide product alongside your sunscreen can help protect your skin from sun damage, potentially warding off complications like discoloration from sunspots.
6. Supports Balanced Oil Production
Another benefit of niacinamide products is that they can help to support a healthy balance in your skin’s sebum production. While it can be helpful on the hydration front, it can also help support a proper amount of oil on your skin. If you have naturally oily skin or are going through a period of struggling with excess oil, niacinamide may help.
7. Addresses Visible Signs of Aging
Niacinamide can be very effective when it comes to minimizing the look of fine lines and wrinkles. It’s partly because it promotes a strong moisture barrier, helps support skin during sun exposure, and soothes irritated skin. All of these properties combined make it a powerful skincare tool.
I love it as part of my Retinol Reform serum. It’s the perfect companion for retinol, which often gets lumped in with other chemical exfoliants and praised for its ability to help support proper skin cell turnover, but is actually remarkable for its powerful antioxidant effects, too.
Combined with niacinamide, these two powerhouses can work wonders on visible signs of aging.
8. Wards Off Oxidative Stress
This is one of those benefits that isn’t just for your skin — it’s for the wellness of your entire body and being. Because of its antioxidant effects, niacinamide may be able to help protect you against free radicals when taken orally as a supplement. When left to their own devices, free radicals can accumulate and lead to oxidative stress.
Niacinamide may help protect your cells from oxidative stress because it can support your body’s ability to repair damaged DNA and fight off the damage in the first place.
9. Helps Soothe Breakouts
In addition to helping to calm redness which can be beneficial for blemishes, niacinamide also helps address pigmentation issues like blemish scars and benefits your skin’s texture. It’s not a replacement for blemish-targeting treatments like salicylic acid or benzoyl peroxide, but it provides some seriously impressive support for breakout-prone skin.
10. Addresses Vitamin B3 Deficiencies
Topical niacinamide products are the most common way to benefit your skin, but you can also take oral niacinamide supplements to support your overall health. While generally, there isn’t a huge need for niacinamide supplements, they can be helpful for certain conditions — specifically B3 deficiencies.
As with any supplement, speak to your doctor before adding one to your routine or diet.
In Conclusion
It can be difficult to figure out the ideal skincare routine for your individual skin. That’s why ingredients like niacinamide are so valuable — they can help just about any person or skin type with such a wide range of issues. So when it comes to niacinamide, the question isn’t why should you use it in your routine — it’s why wouldn’t you?
Sources:
Nicotinic Acid/Niacinamide and the Skin | National Library of Medicine