Every ingredient we decode, on one chart
All 388 ingredients in our glossary, placed by two of the six things we score them on. Search for the one on your bottle and the chart will show you exactly where it sits, and why.
Find yours in it. Type a name, or tap any dot on the chart.
Hydration: How much water the ingredient draws into the skin's surface layer, or holds there.Barrier support: How much it helps the skin's top layer keep water in and irritants out: by sealing it (petrolatum, at 10), by replacing its own lipids (ceramides, cholesterol and fatty acids at 7 to 9), or by repair measured in trials as lower water loss through the skin.What each score means
- active
- humectant
- emollient
- antioxidant
- exfoliant
- everything else
Three things this chart shows
Almost nothing does both. Only 16 of the 388 ingredients score 6 or more for hydration and 6 or more for barrier support: Lactobionic Acid, Glycerin, Colloidal Oatmeal, Pro-vitamin B5, Polyglutamic Acid, Ectoin, Beta-Glucan, Tremella Fuciformis Extract, and a few more. If your barrier is struggling and you want one product to do the work, that short list is where to look.
The bottom-left corner is crowded, and that is the honest part. 142 ingredients score zero on both. They are not bad, they are structural: preservatives, cleansing agents, texture. A formula needs them the way bread needs flour. They just are not why you bought the bottle.
One family sits below the line. Retinoids are the dots under zero (with one mechanical exception, sponge spicules), because they ask something of the barrier while skin adjusts rather than giving something back. That is a reason to introduce them slowly and pair them with the ingredients above, not a reason to skip them.
How a number is made
Each of the six scores is a whole number from 0 to 10 (barrier support can go below zero), set by a person reading that ingredient's evidence note and the studies listed under it, and judged against the ingredient's own job. It is a judgement, not a measurement: no instrument reads a trial and prints a score, and two 7s are alike, not identical. Each ingredient also carries an evidence level (strong, moderate, emerging or weak) that says how solid the studies behind the note are; tap any dot to see its note, its level and its sources. Every ingredient has all six scores, and a 0 means it was never for that job, not that nobody knows. The full method is on how we score.
What each score means
- Hydration
- How much water the ingredient draws into the skin's surface layer, or holds there. The top is the humectants with long records of measured skin moisture (glycerin at 10, the urea and hyaluronic family at 7 to 9); oils and butters sit low to middle, because they slow water loss rather than add water. A 0 means it does not act on skin water at all: a preservative, a UV filter, a fragrance component.
- Barrier support
- How much it helps the skin's top layer keep water in and irritants out: by sealing it (petrolatum, at 10), by replacing its own lipids (ceramides, cholesterol and fatty acids at 7 to 9), or by repair measured in trials as lower water loss through the skin. Below zero means it costs the barrier for a while: the retinoids, which thin and irritate it while skin adjusts, and sponge spicules, which puncture it.
- Anti-aging
- How well it improves the visible signs of age - fine lines, wrinkles, roughness, firmness, and the collagen behind them - as measured in trials. The retinoids hold the top (tretinoin 10, retinol and retinal 9), with bakuchiol, peptides and some antioxidants in the middle; UV filters score a little, because preventing sun damage is anti-aging too.
- Brightening
- How well it fades or prevents uneven pigment: dark spots, melasma, the marks acne leaves. It rests on trials that measure pigment where they exist (hydroquinone and pure vitamin C at 10, cysteamine and thiamidol at 9, the gentler derivatives and the retinoids around 7). Two thirds of the base scores 0 here, because most ingredients never touch pigment.
- Acne support
- How well it helps breakouts: fewer spots, clearer pores, calmer inflammation, as counted in acne trials. Benzoyl peroxide and salicylic acid sit at 10, azelaic acid at 9; soothing or balancing ingredients with only indirect support sit at 1 to 3. It says nothing about clogging pores: that is a separate field, on each ingredient's page.
- Overall efficacy
- How well, and how surely, the ingredient does its own job in a formula, whatever that job is. A preservative that reliably keeps a product safe (methylparaben, 9) or a UV filter that holds its protection (Mexoryl SX, 9) scores as high as a proven active; texture ingredients score low, not because they fail, but because there is no effect on skin to measure. Thin or supplier-only evidence pulls the number down.
List all 388 ingredients, with their two scores
Scores come from our published method, and every dot links to that ingredient's page. Nothing on this chart is hand-placed, and no number in the text above is typed: they are all counted from the same data the dots come from.
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