Good skin care doesn’t start with gimmicks, it starts with good ingredients. Having a little bit of knowledge about what your skin needs, what causes it to look older, and what ingredients will give you youthful, glowing results is all you need to know to choose a skincare regimen that really works. But if you haven’t put decades into understanding skin care and what makes an ingredient effective, don’t worry—Dr. Schultz has done that for you.

Using the feedback from over 180,000 patient visits, Dr. Schultz has taken what he knows to be powerful ingredients and developed them to be even more effective, bringing you the fresh, bright, glowing skin you want, without the irritation. One of those powerhouse ingredients is vitamin C. You may have heard a lot about vitamin C and its benefits for your entire body, but it is a superhero antioxidant when it comes to your facial skin. It brightens your skin and helps make you look younger, all while protecting it from future damage. And that means, it should absolutely have a home in your medicine cabinet and become a staple of your good skin care routine.

What Is Vitamin C Serum? 

According to Dr. Schultz, "Vitamin C is the only antioxidant that can both firm the skin and even skin tone. Everyone should be using vitamin C daily." You’ll often find vitamin C in serum form, which is usually a bit lighter than a cream. Real serums are described as being in a “single chemical phase.” If you’re not a chemist or dermatologist, this might sound complicated, but it’s simple: It just means all the ingredients in the serum dissolve into each other without emulsifiers. An emulsifier will hold a product composed of water and oil together. Think of the water and oil in your skincare products like oil and vinegar for a salad dressing—they separate, so they need emulsifiers to keep them together. Because serums don’t need emulsifiers, they boast a high concentration of their active ingredients. This means you only need to apply a few drops, so real serums tend to come in small bottles and are often on the high-end side of a skincare line.

What Does Vitamin C Serum Do?

So why is vitamin C such a critical antioxidant for the health of your skin? Vitamin C is a melanocyte pigment inhibitor—in human terms, that means it prevents the excess brown pigment that causes unwanted dark spots and blotchiness on your skin. Not only does this even your complexion, but vitamin C is the only antioxidant that effectively smoothes and firms your skin as well, giving you that lustrous, youthful look. And while you might be excited by that gorgeous glow, what’s even more exciting is how vitamin C protects your skin and even your DNA from harmful free radicals. Free radicals is a fancy term for destructive high energy elements created by factors in the environment like smog, pollution, smoke, dust, and most importantly, UVA and UVB from the sun. This free radical damage is the major cause of premature skin-aging, which is to say, it makes you look older. So this powerful antioxidant works double time: it not only treats existing signs of aging but prevents future ones as well.

Vitamin C Serum Benefits

Vitamin C has a myriad of benefits when it comes to your skin. It brightens your tone, makes your skin feel smooth and soft, and protects against harmful environment factors. Watch what Dr. Schultz has to say about this antioxidant and how it benefits your skin:

Is Vitamin C good for skin?

The short answer is yes, because vitamin C is a superhero fighter—it protects you from the harmful effects of free radicals. Protecting your skin means keeping it free from harmful environmental and internal aggressors that not only make it look tired and dull, but can even cause meaningful damage. In other words, vitamin C is the key ingredient to your skin’s youthful look and healthiest glow.

What does Vitamin C do for your face? 

Dr. Schultz says vitamin C is the best antioxidant because of its “potential efficacy, stability, and bioavailability (i.e., ability to be absorbed into skin).” All of these factors make it significant to the overall effectiveness of improving your facial skin’s health. The right kind of vitamin C will make your skin smoother, brighter, and softer.

Is Vitamin C good for dark spots?

Another easy question, because the answer is yes. Vitamin C is key in treating dark spots and blotchiness. This is because, as we mentioned above, it blocks the development of brown pigment (the source of dark spots) in your cells. If you use vitamin C consistently and couple it with a gentle chemical exfoliant, you will be well on your way to reversing those dark spots.

Vitamin C Serum and Anti-Aging

Anti-aging has a lot to do with oxidative stress, which causes wrinkles and discolorations. Dr. Schultz explains, “All the cells in your body are subject to oxidative stress. That is one very fancy term for the fact that all of these cells have these high energy particles, which we call free radicals. These high energy particles unpredictably discharge all of their energy and throw it at the cell’s DNA, at the elastic tissue, at the collagen, and they cause damage.” As we mentioned, free radicals can come from pollution and, of course, one source of free radicals that affects your skin the most is the UV rays emitted from the sun.

Dr. Schultz says, “The purpose and role of antioxidants, especially topical antioxidants, is to absorb that bad energy before it can hit the DNA and the collagen; to absorb it and protect the important parts of your skin and your body.” When free radicals slip through the cracks, antioxidants are the superheroes who help get rid of those “bad guys.” Sunscreen plays defense and helps block the UV rays the sun throws at your skin, but it doesn’t protect you from all of it. Some of the damaging ultraviolet light breaks through and can still cause damage. Antioxidants neutralize the damage done by sacrificing themselves to the free radicals in place of your skin cells. This helps repair your skin and protect you from wrinkles or discolorations from sun exposure.

How Do Your Use Vitamin C Serum on Your Face?

So now that you know how vital vitamin C is to your healthy, youthful-looking skin—how should you use it? If you’re using a vitamin C serum, just a couple of pumps should do. After exfoliating, take one to two pumps of the serum and lightly apply it all over your face. After it absorbs, feel free to continue with any moisturizers you may want to use.

No matter which kind of vitamin C you use, just remember that it should have these three elements: stability, absorption, and “pleasantness.” Your vitamin C needs to be stable so it won’t “go bad”; if it’s not stable, it won’t do what you want it to do. It needs to absorb into your skin, so it must be oil-soluble. If you’re using a vitamin C with water-soluble ascorbic acid, it can only absorb poorly into your skin, and thus it will give you neither the protection against free radicals you need, nor the brightening, firming, or evening of skin tone. And finally, your vitamin C should be pleasant. It should never be sticky, smelly, or tacky, which could all be signs that it’s becoming oxidized, which sadly inactivates it and renders it useless. Once you’ve found your perfect vitamin C, here’s a quick tip to extend its shelf-life: store it in your fridge.

When Do You Use Vitamin C Serum?

After you exfoliate each evening, use your vitamin C serum. Although this serum can protect against the sun, renew skin, and even out skin coloration, its most important job is to absorb into cells to protect the skin. That’s why it’s important to only apply antioxidants at nighttime. Antioxidants work like sponges once they soak into the cells. If they are applied in the morning, their sponge-like characteristics will absorb the damaging light and be destroyed. So, if they’re applied when there is no light to destroy them, they will work better and more effectively to brighten, firm, and tone your skin.

Best Vitamin C Serum

Dr. Schultz says, “The two forms of vitamin C that I like the most are tetrahexadecyl ascorbate and methyl silanol ascorbate, both of which are fat- or lipid-soluble, which increases their absorption into the skin.” It’s imperative to use products with the right type of antioxidants. BeautyRx's Triple Vitamin C Serum is a stable product (never sticky or smelly) that makes your skin smoother, brighter and softer. It also absorbs three times faster than other vitamin C serums. All of that means it works just as well from the first drop to the last. And equally as important, you’ll love the way it feels immediately upon application. This next-generation vitamin C serum is the optimal formula to fight against dull skin and to nourish skin cells. In a consumer study, 100% of participants said their skin looked smoother, brighter, softer, and more youthful.

Your At-Home Regimen

If you’re just starting to add in this superhero antioxidant to your routine, it couldn’t be simpler. After exfoliating, apply your vitamin C and head to bed knowing it’s working on your behalf. You’ll wake up with a fresh feeling, a bright glow, and newfound love for this powerful serum.