I love it when skincare is stripped bare. Take away all the unnecessary layers and extra frills and leave in only the stuff that works. You know, the active ingredients that do the heavy lifting. Less chance of irritations that way. And wading through the label becomes a breeze. La Roche Posay Serozinc is stripped like that.
All is left with is water, zinc sulfate and salt (yes, Sodium Chloride sounds posher, but it is still table salt). I know what you’re thinking. Why should you splurge on a tube of water, salt and zinc? Because zinc is a miracle cure for acne. Or so they say. But is that true? Is this simple skincare product really the cure to all your acne woes? Let’s find out together:
- Key Ingredients In La Roche Posay Serozinc: What Makes It Work?
- The Rest Of The Formula & Ingredients
- Texture
- Fragrance
- How To Use It
- Performance & Personal Opinion
- What I Like About La Roche Posay Serozinc
- What I DON’T Like About La Roche Posay Serozinc
- Who Should Use This?
- Packaging
- Does La Roche Posay Serozinc Live Up To Its Claims?
- Price & Availability
- The Verdict: Should You Buy It?
- Dupes & Alternatives
Key Ingredients In La Roche Posay Serozinc: What Makes It Work?
ZINC SULFATE TO TREAT ACNE
Zinc is a metal ion naturally found in meat, nuts, whole grains and legumes. It’s an essential nutrient your body needs to work properly. For example, wounds can’t heal without it. In anti-acne products, Zinc is used for its oil-regulation properties. It reduces the production of hormones responsible for excessive oil production. Less oil = fewer breakouts.
The catch? Zinc comes in many forms. You’ve guessed it, some are more effective than others. La Roche Posay Serozinc uses Zinc Sulphate. Zinc Sulphate helps treat acne – when taken orally. When typically applied to the skin, it doesn’t work any better than the placebo. But it’s more irritating. What a bummer!
Related: Can Zinc Really Help Treat Acne?
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The Rest Of The Formula & Ingredients
NOTE: The colours indicate the effectiveness of an ingredient. It is ILLEGAL to put toxic and harmful ingredients in skincare products.
- Green: It’s effective, proven to work, and helps the product do the best possible job for your skin.
- Yellow: There’s not much proof it works (at least, yet).
- Red: What is this doing here?!
- Water: Found in almost all skincare products on the market, this is the main solvent. It helps dissolve other ingredients to create a liquid texture. Plus, it has hydrating properties to boot.
- Sodium Chloride: Known as table salt, it’s a binding and thickening agent.
Texture
It’s a spray, so imagine your face with sprayed with a very lightweight, fast-absorbing liquid. It’s not tacky and doesn’t leave any residue behind.
Fragrance
It’s fragrance-free. I really appreciate that. This is meant to help with acne, an inflammatory disease. Fragrance is one of the most irritating ingredients in skincare and can cause inflammation. Leaving it out was a good call. And no, the product doesn’t stink. It doesn’t smell like much of anything, really.
How To Use It
It’s super easy to use. Just spray it on your face right after cleansing. Leave to absorb for a few minutes and then pat it in. Then, continue with the rest of your skincare routine as normal.
Performance & Personal Opinion
La Roche Posay Serozinc sort of failed its theory test. The science isn’t there. But, what about its practice test? I’ve been using it for a few weeks even though my skin isn’t particularly oily at the moment. Just a bit shiny on my t-zone. That’s where I also get the occasional bout of blackheads.
Even though I’ve been spraying Serozinc on my face every morning, I can’t say it did anything for me. It felt refreshing on the skin, which is something I’d definitely appreciate a lot in summer. Not so much now, you know? But, apart from that, I can’t report any other benefits. 🙁
Even so, I don’t think it’s totally useless. Lots of people are using it with good results. After all, zinc does help with acne, so I tend to believe zinc sulfate helps acne a little bit too. But there are much better treatments out there. If you switch Serozinc for a treatment with salicylic acid, benzoyl peroxide or sulfur, you’ll see much better results, and much faster too.
Related: Salicylic Acid VS Benzoyl Peroxide: Which One Is Better?
What I Like About La Roche Posay Serozinc
- Lightweight, fast-absorbing texture
- Fragrance-free
- Hydrating and refreshing
- Big bottle
What I DON’T Like About La Roche Posay Serozinc
- The form of Zinc it uses isn’t proven to reduce acne topically yet
Who Should Use This?
I can’t recommend this to anyone. It doesn’t have the science to back up its effectiveness yet and the practical test didn’t yield incredible results either.
Packaging
It comes in a blue and white spray bottle. I like it. The blue colour is eye-catching. The size is quite big. And the spray applicator is practical and easy to use. It’s just too bulky to travel with.
Does La Roche Posay Serozinc Live Up To Its Claims?
| CLAIM | TRUE? |
|---|---|
| A facial mist toner featuring Zinc Sulphate, specifically designed to target key signs of oily, blemish-prone skin. | It’s a mist toner designed for this, but it doesn’t do anything for your skin. |
| Skin is mattified and looks less greasy and shiny. | Didn’t do it for me. |
Price & Availability
50ml, £5.00; 150ml, £10.00 at La Roche Posay
The Verdict: Should You Buy It?
No, it doesn’t work! Save your money for something else that can get the job done, like a Salicylic Acid exfoliant or a Sulfur spot treatment.
Dupes & Alternatives
- The Ordinary Niacinamide 10% + Zinc 1% (£5.00): Niacinamide is an anti-aging superstar that hydrates, soothes irritations, treats acne, and reduces redness. Zinc helps absorb excess oil to reduce acne. It’s drying, so use it only if you have oily, acne-prone skin that produces too much oil. Available at Beauty Bay, Cult Beauty, Nordstrom, Sephora, SpaceNK, The Ordinary and Ulta.
Ingredients
Water, Sodium Chloride, Zinc Sulfate
Speaking about sulfur and zinc,they both will help your psoriasis. The zinc if u take it orally,and the sulfur if u apply it topically. U can buy sulfur soap and use it on your psoriasis and it’s supposed to have good results on making it go away. I don’t have psoriasis,so I cannot speak from experience but I’ve known people who do have it. Also, dead sea salts and Epsom salts if u soaked in it can help and I’ve heard that apple cider vinegar applied topically gets rid of a lot of the flakes,at least according to this guy who attests to how it’s helped him with his severe psoriasis,on his blog Psoriasis Blob.
I’m guessing that the AVC works so well because AVC contains glycolic acid which is why I believe it works so well on helping some people who use it for acne. In fact, sometimes dermatologists prescribe glycolic acid to their patients with psoriasis and it’s supposed to be really effective,so surprisingly I’m shocked it’s not a common known treatment for that skin condition. Future Derm swears by glycolic acid creams for making her psoriasis go away.
Improving your gut heath and avoiding certain foods is a little-known way to help psoriasis, because most dermatologists are only taught to treat the symptom,and not the root cause. Your psoriasis for example,could just mean that you have a gluten intolerance so gluten just aggravates it rearing its ugly head.
Hannah, thank you so much for your helpful and thoughtful comment. I couldn’t agree more with you, especially on how doctor treat only the symptoms. I’m sure people with psoriasis will find your recommendations very useful.
Oh…how I wished I have read this article before ordering it.
Crude Curator, 🙁
I’m from Brazil and the marketing over this product in here is HUGE. So I bought it. And God knows how sorry I am for that. It doesn’t work at all!!
Thamyres, oh no!! It’s so unfair you can’t get a refund when something doesn’t work.
If I’d ONLY read this last night. I’ve been working to repair the moisture barrier on the right side of my face, which was damaged by a nefarious manuka honey product. It’s been WEEKS of redness and irritation. I decided to step it up with a water-based “essence” with hyaluronic acid and finally an moisturizer/occlusive. I worried essences might irritate with essential oils, so I decided to give the Serozinc a try. Serozinc + hyaluron + weleda skin food = a horrible red rash!!! I’ve tried shea butter, LRP cicaplast, squalene oil (was actually having decent results with that), NIOD’s modulating glucosides, super spendy Chuda cream (a sample thank goodness), LXMI nilotica butter (spendy special shea butter), homeoplasmine, the list goes on. Any tips would be GREATLY appreciated. Considering a dermatologist, but I suspect there’s no pharma treatment.
Joni, oh no! So sorry to hear that. Definitely stay away from anything with essential oils. When your skin is in this state, you just want to use a gentle cleanser and a fragrance-free, irritants-free moisturiser with barrier repairing ingredients like Paula’s Choice Clinical Ultra rich Moisturiser, Paula’s Choice Calm Redness Relief Moisturiser or The Ordinary Natural Moisturising Factors. Hope this helps.