20 Products to Winterize Your Skincare Routine

hydrating skincare products

Graphic by KCM

Keep your skin moisturized, healthy, and radiant.

It goes without saying that winter is a tough season for your skin. Colder air means lower humidity, and having the heat on dries out the air indoors. These factors and more lead to — you guessed it — dry, itchy, dull skin that seems to soak up your normal moisturizer in an instant. Luckily, there are plenty of products you can add to your morning or evening skincare routine to keep your body’s largest organ glowing and healthy no matter how overactive your radiator is. 

We found 20 essentials, from face scrubs to body lotions, that will winterize your skincare routine. Among the highlights are exfoliating products to gently slough off dead skin cells and serums designed to penetrate the outer layers of your skin to revitalize it from the inside out. We’ve also kept our eyes out for standout ingredients like vitamin C, hydrating oils, hyaluronic acid, and more that help protect and strengthen your skin year-round.

No matter what your problem areas are, we have you covered. Read on for the best winter skincare products below.

20 Best Winter Skincare Products

Beauty Pie Overnight Skin Perfector 2.0

Beauty Pie

Give your skin a little overnight love with this mask. It contains retinol and caviar lime extract for gentle exfoliation and skin brightening, plus moisturizing ingredients like castor seed oil and shea butter. This way you can slough off any dead skin and moisturize your skin in your sleep, literally.

$15+ at Beauty Pie

Augustinus Bader Rich Cream

Augustinus Bader

The Rich Cream is one of those cult-favorite products that manages to do it all. Powered by Augustinus Bader’s patented TFC8 technology, this moisturizer supports skin’s cellular renewal to help diminish concerns like fine lines, dark spots, acne, and more. It’s supercharged with powerful ingredients like argan oil, avocado oil, and evening primrose oil to help hydrate your skin and keep it that way.

$280 at AB

ILIA Lip Wrap Overnight Treatment

ILIA

ILIA’s lip mask is a great addition to the nighttime routine of anyone who has a lip balm for every coat and purse. It works as both an exfoliator and a moisturizer to help smooth chapped lips.

$26 at ILIA

Indie Lee Squalane Facial Oil

Indie Lee

If facial oils are your preferred formula — or you’re looking for an intro oil that doesn’t have a complicated ingredient list — Indie Lee’s squalane oil is the way to go. It’s made of the singular ingredient — pure, olive-derived squalane oil — that absorbs quickly and boosts your skin’s ability to retain moisture. It’s suitable for all skin types and works from season to season.

$36 at Indie Lee

Caire Beauty Try Me Glowmaker Duo

Caire Beauty

Caire’s mask-and-serum duo is designed specifically for skin affected by hormone decline and menopause. They both contain hyaluronic acid molecules that penetrate deep into your skin to smooth, plump, and hydrate it from the inside out. Get this 15-day supply to try the combination out.

$46 at Caire Beauty

True Botanicals Ginger Turmeric Cleansing Balm

True Botanicals

The cleansing step in our beauty routine can be drying, which we definitely don’t need in the winter. This cleansing balm from True Botanicals easily removes makeup and impurities — and is even safe to use around your eyes — without stripping away moisture. It contains lactic acid and azelaic acid to gently exfoliate your skin while encouraging moisture retention.

$48 at TB

Yon-Ka Lait Nettoyant

Yon-Ka

For something a little lighter (but still gentle, hydrating, and effective), we suggest Yon-Ka’s cleansing milk. It has a luxuriously soft feel and gently clears away impurities while soothing the skin, making it ideal if your skin is on the oilier side. 

$48 at Yon-Ka

Fig.1 Pro-Retinol Eye Cream

Fig.1

There’s nothing less motivating than waking up with dark circles under your eyes, and it only gets worse in the winter. Fig.1’s Pro-Retinol Eye Cream delivers a shot of moisture to your skin morning and night. Packed with retinyl palmitate and collagen-boosting peptides, the formula works to help you look and feel more refreshed, while diminishing fine lines and puffiness around your eyes.

$36 at Fig.1

maude bath

maude

Who doesn’t love a warm soak in the dead of winter? maude’s soothing bath formula includes coconut milk powder to soften your skin and Dead Sea salts that detoxify your skin and infuse it with vitamins and minerals. It’s a perfect treat after a long day. 

$18 at maude

Droplette Collagen Hydrofiller Set

Droplette

Droplette’s clinically tested device transforms serums into a micro-mist that penetrates the skin’s surface 20 times deeper than other topical skincare products, meaning those powerful skincare ingredients can actually get to where they’ll be most effective. Droplette’s Collagen Hydrofiller set is a great jumping-off point and leaves skin feeling plump, hydrated, and rejuvenated.

For an exclusive 20 percent discount, enter code KCMDROP20.

$338 at Droplette

Thistle Farms Body Butter

Thistle Farms

Your face and hands aren’t the only areas that suffer during the winter — all that dryness affects the rest of your body’s skin, too. Thistle Farms’ Body Butter glides on smoothly without ever feeling greasy, giving you all of the benefits of a rich moisturizer with none of the drawbacks.

$18 at Thistle Farms

Prima Beyond Body Oil

Prima

For a luxurious post-shower experience, we recommend incorporating Prima’s fragrant body oil into your lineup. It’s deeply hydrating and contains ingredients like squalane, helichrysum, and jojoba seed oil meant to soothe and nourish dry, irritated skin. Mix a pump of it in with your go-to body lotion and massage it into your skin.

$56 at Prima

Brandless Avocado Basil Hand Cream

Brandless

Winter seems to hit our hands overnight: One day you just wake up to dry, cracked knuckles and flaky skin. We love the mild, refreshing smell of this hand cream from Brandless, and at just $5, you can buy one for every room in the house.

$5 at Brandless

Winky Lux Orange You Bright Exfoliator

Winky Lux

This exfoliator is a combination of a mask and a face scrub. You smooth it onto your face, leave it for a couple of minutes, then rinse it off to reveal smoother and more even skin. It’s super gentle and unlike most physical exfoliators, it doesn’t contain any polluting microplastics. 

$28 at Winky Lux

Versed Shortcut Overnight Facial

Versed

Scrub-type exfoliators can be too harsh for sensitive or mature skin, so if you fall into that camp, we recommend a chemical exfoliator for a gentler experience. This overnight mask contains lactic acid and glycolic acid that leave your skin bright and refreshed, but not dry. 

$10 at Versed

ILIA Balmy Tint Hydrating Lip Balm

ILIA

ILIA’s Balmy Tint lip balm combines rich color with hydrating ingredients like shea butter to simplify your lip care. No more applying lip balm, then lipstick, then more lip balm — one swipe of this and you’re set.

$28 at ILIA

Prima Clean Hands Hydrating Hand Sanitizer Spray

Prima

As we said, hands take a real beating in the winter, especially now that we’re more vigilant about hand washing and sanitizing. Prima’s hand sanitizer contains ultra-hydrating ceramides and quinoa extract to keep your hands from getting too dry while staying germ-free.

$10 at Prima

Aquaphor Healing Ointment

Amazon

Year after year, we return to Aquaphor’s classic ointment when it comes to dry and damaged skin. It helps to quickly repair bleeding knuckles, cracked heels, chapped lips, dry elbows, and just about any other skin complaint you may have. It’s a use-everywhere cure-all we can’t live without.

$17 at Amazon

Oak Essentials Balancing Mist

Oak Essentials

If you find that your skin gets dry during the day no matter how much moisturizer you apply in the morning, consider carrying a hydrating mist like this one from Oak Essentials in your purse for a midday spritz. Its standout ingredients include aloe, glycerin, and rose water, all of which soothe and hydrate the skin. 

$44 at OE