Washing your face too often: how many times a day

Washing your face more often when you are breaking out is the most logical wrong move in skincare. The reasoning is sound at every step: acne involves oil, washing removes oil, so more washing should mean less acne. The American Academy of Dermatology (AAD) disagrees, and says why.

Skinli gives general education and is not a doctor. Deep or painful acne needs a dermatologist.

The number dermatologists give

The AAD's advice for caring for acne-prone skin is specific:

Keep your skin clean. Gently wash your face up to twice daily and after sweating.

Twice a day, plus after anything that makes you sweat. That is the limit, and the word "up to" means once is also within the advice.

On its separate list of 10 habits that can worsen acne, the AAD explains what happens past that number:

Wash your face throughout the day. Washing your face several times a day can further irritate your skin, leading to more breakouts.

Its instruction there repeats the same figure: wash twice a day, when you wake up and before you go to bed, and also when you finish an activity that makes you sweat.

So over-washing is not treated as a neutral habit that simply does not help. It sits on a list of things to stop, next to scrubbing and popping.

Why more washing backfires

The mechanism the AAD describes is irritation.

Washing strips oil from the surface. Strip too much, too often, and the skin becomes dry. The AAD's position on dry skin is direct, in the entry about drying the skin out:

Dry skin is irritated skin. Anytime you irritate your skin, you risk getting more acne.

That gives the full loop. Wash too often, skin gets dry, dry skin is irritated, irritated skin risks more acne, more acne prompts more washing.

The loop is hard to see from inside because each wash feels productive. Skin looks oily at midday, you wash, it feels clean for an hour. The tightness that follows an hour later does not obviously connect to the wash that caused it, and the breakouts that follow days later connect even less.

The same mistake with a different product

The AAD covers a close relative of over-washing on the same page, and it is worth reading together:

Skin with acne is oily, so it can be tempting to apply astringent and acne treatments until your face feels dry. Don't.

Its advice is to use acne treatments as directed, apply a moisturizer made for acne-prone skin if the skin feels dry, and avoid astringents, rubbing alcohol, and anything else that dries the skin out.

"Until your face feels dry" is the instinct both habits share. A tight, squeaky face reads as clean. In the AAD's framing it reads as irritated.

Moisturizer for acne-prone skin covers the other half of that advice, and damaged skin barrier covers what happens when the stripping has gone on for a while.

The technique matters as much as the frequency

The AAD is unusually precise about technique, and almost every detail points the same way: gentler.

From its habits page, under scrubbing:

Be gentle when washing your face and other skin with acne. You want to use a mild, non-comedogenic cleanser. Apply the cleanser lightly with your fingertips, using a circular motion. Gently rinse it off with warm water, using only your fingers. Then pat your skin dry with a clean towel.

From its tips page:

Choose a gentle, non-abrasive cleanser. Apply it with your fingertips, as scrubbing with washcloths, sponges, and other tools can irritate your skin.

Collected, that is the full method:

• A mild, non-comedogenic, non-abrasive cleanser.
• Applied with fingertips, in a circular motion, lightly.
• Rinsed with warm water, using only the fingers.
• Patted dry with a clean towel, not rubbed.
• No washcloths, sponges or brushes.

The AAD also tells you what to avoid in the products around the wash: gentle products labelled alcohol-free, and avoiding astringents, toners and exfoliants, which it says can dry the skin and make acne appear worse.

How often to exfoliate your face and over-exfoliation cover the exfoliant half of that in more depth.

Sweat is the one reason to add a wash

The exception in the AAD's advice is sweating, and it appears in both sources: wash after sweating, and wash when you finish an activity that makes you sweat.

There is a related instruction about what to do during the activity itself. The AAD names rubbing sweat from the skin during a workout as one of its 10 habits. Using a towel to rub sweat away with force can irritate the skin, which can cause breakouts. What it says to do instead is to use a clean towel to gently pat sweat from the skin.

Pat, not rub. Clean towel. The same gentleness rule as the wash itself.

NIAMS, part of the US National Institutes of Health, adds a separate point about exercise that is not about washing at all. On its list of things that do not cause acne but may make it worse, it names pressure from sports helmets, tight clothes, or backpacks. Sweat, gym gear and back acne covers both the sweat and the pressure.

Why the instinct is so strong

It is worth naming why this habit is harder to drop than the others on the AAD's list.

Most of the 10 habits are things people do once they know better and stop. Over-washing is different, because it gives immediate feedback that points the wrong way. The face looks less oily straight after a wash. That is a real, visible result, arriving within a minute.

The cost arrives on a slower clock. Tightness comes an hour later and gets blamed on the weather or the room. Breakouts come days later and get blamed on whatever was eaten or touched in between. By the time the skin is worse, the wash that contributed to it is long out of mind.

This is also why counting is useful. Most people asked how often they wash say twice, because twice is the routine they intend. The honest number includes the midday rinse after the gym, the splash before going out, and the extra wash on a day the skin looked bad. Those are the washes the AAD's limit is about.

If the count comes to four or five, the change is not willpower. It is replacing the midday wash with a gentle pat using a clean towel, which is what the AAD advises during a workout anyway.

The evening wash matters most

If you are going to wash once rather than twice, the evening is the one to keep, because of what the AAD says about makeup.

Sleeping in makeup is on its list of 10 habits that worsen acne. The entry says even non-comedogenic makeup can cause acne if you sleep in it, and the instruction is to remove makeup before bed with no exceptions, using a non-comedogenic makeup remover towelette if you are too tired to wash.

That is one of the firmest statements on the whole list. Does makeup cause acne covers the rest of it.

What to change, and what to leave alone

If you currently wash three, four or five times a day, the change is to bring it down to twice plus after sweating, and to add a moisturizer made for acne-prone skin if the skin feels dry.

What not to do at the same time is change your acne treatment. The AAD lists trying a new acne treatment every week or so as the first of its 10 habits, because switching irritates the skin and causes breakouts, and says to give a product 6 to 8 weeks before judging it, with complete clearing generally taking 3 to 4 months.

Changing the washing and the treatment in the same week also leaves you unable to tell which one did anything.

When to see a doctor

The AAD says many people can control acne by following these skin care tips and using treatment bought without a prescription, and that a dermatologist can help if acne continues after the tips have had a chance to work. Deep or painful acne needs a dermatologist, and some people need prescription-strength treatment. With the right help, it says, virtually everyone who has acne can see clearer skin.

Acne triggers: which daily habits actually matter sets washing beside the other habits on the same AAD list.