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From tackling crow’s feet and turkey necks to dark spots, these skincare must-haves are the best route to a younger-looking you
Like England choking at a penalty shoot-out, ageing is one of those things that you pray won’t happen yet recognise as an inevitability. While growing old is unavoidable, looking old isn’t. You can’t halt the appearance of fine lines, wrinkles or age spots, of course, but with the right anti-ageing products, you can slow their progress.
Such is the allure of the anti-ageing promise that there are scores of wrinkle-busting, complexion enhancing, skin-protecting products on the market for men now – from fancy serums to revitalising scrubs. But perhaps the most useful weapon a man can have in his anti-ageing armoury is a decent daily face cream.
On a very basic level, using a moisturiser will help bolster the skin’s natural protective barrier. What makes anti-ageing moisturisers different from ordinary ones, however, are the added active ingredients, such as water-binding hyaluronic acid, skin-protecting sunscreen, and complexion-boosting collagen.
With recent research by Nivea revealing that 65 per cent of men aged 35+ would like to do more to slow down the signs of ageing, it’s clear there’s a place for an anti-ageing cream in every man’s grooming repertoire.
Question is, which cream do you choose? Luckily, we’ve tried some of the best lotions and potions out there and narrowed it down to these best anti-ageing creams for men.
Without the benefit of time travel, it’s hard to say, conclusively, what results any anti-ageing product delivers. But it is possible to rate them based on immediate results, the kind of ingredients they include and, of course, overall value for money, because there’s nothing more ageing than an overdraft. Keep reading for our full tried and tested round-up.
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The latest face saver from Nivea Men, this clever cream features an SPF30 sunscreen, skin-plumping hyaluronic acid and a patented ingredient called luminous630. The latter is designed to help prevent dark spots from forming and prevent existing ones from getting bigger or deeper in colour. All this makes it a great choice, not only for younger guys wanting to dodge dark spots (prevention is always better than cure) but also for older ones wanting to minimise any pre-existing damage.
A little of this lightweight lotion goes a long way, and its barely-there scent is pretty inoffensive. It immediately sank into the skin, leaving no residue or shine, and kept skin feeling hydrated all day long, though we did reapply again in the afternoon as per the product’s instructions.
Given all it does, this cream is superb value for money, and the lockable, pump-action delivery system means it’s perfect for gym or travel bags.
Bulldog is renowned for providing affordable, straightforward, efficacious skincare, with an ethical emphasis – the products are vegan-friendly, cruelty-free, and free of synthetic fragrances and artificial colours. The brand also strives to reduce its impact on the environment.
Designed for mature skin, Bulldog’s age defence moisturiser helps keep dry skin hydrated, while an antioxidant complex of rosemary, echinacea and vitamin E should protect against the ageing process.
This moisturiser doesn’t have a sunscreen, but it still makes a brilliant everyday anti-ageing essential – and all for under a tenner.
One of the stars of Japanese skincare brand Shiseido’s total age defence range for men, this high-performance cream aims to tackle the five main issues skin faces as we age – namely wrinkles, sagging, dullness, unevenness, and lost firmness.
This revitalizer cream does this with the help of rice bran oil complex to speed up cell turnover, xylitol to help moisturise, and nicotinamide to improve skin elasticity and tackle age-related pigmentation.
It’s certainly not the cheapest product we tried, but it has one of the best textures – incredibly light and quickly absorbed. Meanwhile, the barely-there scent and elegant, minimalist packaging made it one of our favourites.
American grooming brand Lab Series has always been at the forefront of men’s skincare, utilising the latest technology to deliver better-looking skin. So it’s no surprise that its recent rebrand also sees it offer newly refillable products in the max LS range.
Suitable for all skin types, the anti-age max LS lotion (previously known as max LS power v lifting lotion) is the most lightweight of all the anti-agers here, sinking into the skin in an instant, while leaving no shine. It also features a raft of anti-ageing ingredients to support collagen production, improve elasticity, boos the skin’s cellular energy and minimise fine lines. You can definitely feel a slight tightening effect on the skin, which is always welcome in an anti-ageing cream.
The fact that you can now buy eco-friendly refill cartridges (£41.65, Escentual.com) for the stylish bottle is the icing on the cake.
A reworked and repackaged version of dermatologist Dr Dennis Gross’s cult advanced retinol and ferulic intense wrinkle cream (yes, even face creams can have a face lift), this premium moisturiser is packed with potent anti-ageing ingredients.
It includes antioxidant ferulic acid and retinol – the anti-ageing world’s go-to ingredient – and is made for boosting collagen, speeding up cell turnover and tackling hyperpigmentation.
As well as helping smooth fine lines and plumping skin, the presence of ceramides helps fortify the skin’s naturally protective barrier. It has a great, silky-rich texture, is quickly absorbed and its presence on your bathroom shelf is guaranteed to show off your skincare smarts.
Dr D, meanwhile, has over 25 years of experience dealing with people’s skin problems, so if he can’t help you with your wrinkles, we don’t know who can.
With awards from everyone from GQ to Forbes, Australian grooming brand Patricks has become a byword for luxury grooming (its face scrub features crushed diamonds, after all).
Designed for normal to dry skin, its antioxidant-packed am1 moisturiser features a roll call of skin-saving essentials – from vitamins C and E, hyaluronic acid and omega 3 to creatine and squalane – to encourage collagen production and improve skin elasticity.
Formulated to hydrate skin for 24 hours (which it certainly seemed to do), it’s quickly absorbed, leaves a matte finish, and feels more potent than a traditional moisturiser.
As you might expect for a product created by leading supplement brand Vitabiotics, this value-for-money wrinkle buster is packed with antioxidants and vitamins to help guard against premature ageing. It also features an SPF15 sunscreen to help minimise sun-induced fine lines and pigmentation.
It’s designed to offer 12-hour hydration and has a nice, thick, creamy texture and a minimal, slightly vanilla scent that’s not too overpowering.
One of the richer creams we tested, it instantly makes skin feel softer and more supple (though it takes a little longer to be absorbed than lighter creams) and the pump dispenser is a plus, minimising the risk of using too much. It’s designed for all skin types but we reckon it’d be particularly good for drier skin.
Unfortunately, this product is currently unavailable and we will let you know when it is in stock again.
A medium-weight daily hydrator, with only a slightly floral fragrance, Dermalogica’s SPF50 daily moisturiser has been specifically designed to defend against skin damage and UV-induced ageing.
Packing the joint-highest protection sunscreen of the products on our list (it’s also a chemical one, which doesn’t leave white residue on the skin), it offers broad spectrum protection against both the sun’s burning UVB rays and the UVA ones that are largely responsible for skin ageing. On top of that, antioxidant white tea is included to help counteract the effects of solar damage, while glucosamine HCL helps minimise hyperpigmentation.
As a bonus – yes, there’s more – it also contains ingredients to minimise the detrimental effects of sugar on the skin’s firmness and elasticity. If you spend a lot of time outdoors (or have a sweet tooth), this is the anti-ager for you.
Offering an affordable, 360-degree approach to combatting the ageing process, the hero of Nivea Men’s anti-age range features hyaluronic acid. This is a useful ingredient, since as we age our skin’s ability to produce the important acid is reduced, leading to a loss of moisture, volume, and elasticity.
As well as tackling the visible signs of ageing by helping minimise wrinkles and firming the skin, it also contains an SPF15 sunscreen to help guard against future wrinkle formation.
A pump dispenser means you can measure out just the right dose, and it’s available in a cream or gel formula, the former being a bit better for drier skins. The slight fragrance won’t be for everyone but costing under £15, this cream is fantastic value for money, given everything it does.
Apart from the amazing name (who’s not enticed by the idea of a “resurrection” cream?), this award-winning anti-ager has a lot of things going for it. For starters, it’s organic, contains sunscreen and two per cent of profits from the sales of Vitruvian Man products go to mental health charities.
This cream gets its name from the inclusion of an ingredient extracted from a super-hardy desert plant known as “the resurrection plant” – one that can come back to life even after years of dehydration. It acts as a rapid moisturiser, ensuring skin stays hydrated and healthy. Snow mushroom also helps moisturise and has anti-inflammatory properties, so this cream really does harness the best nature has to offer.
It’s thicker than most of the creams we tried so takes a little longer to massage in, but it left a superior matte finish with skin feeling super hydrated. Out of stock at the moment, the site promises “it’s coming soon”.
A brilliant, no-fuss, daily wrinkle buster, this vegan-friendly, anti-ageing cream from British brand Mojo impressed us with its creamy, quickly absorbed texture and pleasant scent (a blend of tobacco notes and spices like cardamom and coriander). At 75ml, it’s great value for money, and the gold bling packaging is a stand-out, too.
The hero ingredients here are sodium hyaluronate – often regarded as a superior version of hyaluronic acid, which is especially good for dry, wrinkle-prone skin – and pro-vitamin B5, a moisturising powerhouse that helps support the skin’s barrier function, keeping it soft and supple. Pro-vitamin B5 is also good for hair too, making this moisturiser particularly useful for guys with stubble.
If you’re looking for a product that really captures the zeitgeist of the skincare industry at the moment, then this deceptively simple facial balm from British brand Pelegrims is it.
Using locally sourced ingredients (in this case, upcycled waste from the Westwell Wines vineyard in Kent), it keeps ingredients to a minimum, is produced in small batches (limited-edition is the new luxury) and puts sustainability at its heart. It’s also designed to help your skin support itself, with antioxidant resveratrol from the grapes promoting rejuvenation, and marine algae boosting natural collagen synthesis.
It’s a balm, though, so has a rich texture, which is more suitable to older or drier skins. We found a little goes a very long way, so go easy on the application.
Green People is the go-to brand for anyone looking for organic-based, cruelty-free, vegan-friendly grooming. Although there is a dedicated men’s range, it’s this unisex, scent-free cream that’s best for holding back the years.
As well as ticking all the ethical boxes, it has a lovely texture (we found it kept skin moisturised all day long), is fragrance-free (so great for sensitive skin) and features 89 per cent organic ingredients and a raft of plant oils, vitamins, and minerals to support the skin’s natural repair and defence processes.
It’s also formulated with baicalin – a plant-derived anti-inflammatory antioxidant that helps counteract the ageing effects of the sun’s UV rays.
As we age and collagen production changes, skin tends to lose its elasticity and firmness, with the result that everything starts heading south. This clever gel-cream (it contains both textures that only mix as you apply) aims to correct that slow slide slightly by tightening skin a little.
Featuring three key plant extracts (oat, baccharis and centella asiatica) that tone skin, it’s designed to be used specifically around the jawline. But since it also acts as a moisturiser, it can be used on the entire face and neck. As a bonus, it has Clarins’s anti-pollution complex to help guard against the damaging effects of pollution.
After a little time on the skin, you definitely notice a slight tightening. Don’t get us wrong, it’s not going to give you a noticeable facelift – only an actual facelift is going to do that – but it does tighten the skin slightly, and when it comes to anti-ageing, every little helps, right?
This anti-ageing avenger is made in Britain and was created by three guys whose main mission was to reduce the number of skin cancers in men. It might not contain fancy antioxidants and other hero wrinkle-busting ingredients, but it does pack a broad-spectrum sunscreen with a generous SPF of 30. It’s also great value for money, given this is a 100ml tube which Lifejacket estimates will last you up to six months.
Its lightweight, fragrance-free, no-shine formulation impressed us, and though it goes on white, the sunscreen disappears completely with a little massaging. A good, year-round, no-frills moisturiser with anti-ageing benefits as a bonus.
A cult brand in the UK, France’s finest skincare brand for men has plenty of products worth getting acquainted with, but this clever firming gel is its go-to if you’d like to reduce sagging and minimise wrinkles.
Featuring two forms of hyaluronic acid to moisturise and minimise fine lines, it also contains skin-strengthening peptides and kakadu plum extract to boost collagen and enhance skin’s elasticity.
More of a serum than a cream, it does act as moisturiser, though if you have very dry skin, we’d suggest adding a moisturising cream over it – once it’s been fully absorbed – for maximum all-day hydration.
If you’re a city dweller looking for an anti-ageing product that protects skin from anything urban life can throw at it, this award-winning lightweight lotion is your man.
As well as packing a broad spectrum SPF50 sunscreen for max protection against sun damage, it’s also designed to shield skin from 98 per cent of blue light rays emitted by computers, TV and phones – rays that studies show may also age skin. On top of that, it features a polymer matrix that creates a shield on the surface of the skin to rebuff toxic pollution, making it the perfect choice if you work or live in a traffic-congested town or city.
Given that it’s formulated with a 100 per cent mineral sunscreen, we were amazed by how smoothly the product goes onto skin, with none of the white residue sometimes associated with this kind of SPF. It does have that mineral sunscreen smell you get with sun creams, but that’s a small quibble for a product which is essentially a suit of armour for your skin.
Nothing makes a face look old quite like fatigue. If skin is stressed out and ashen following a sleepless night, period of stress of weapon-grade hangover, it’s definitely not going to look its most youthful. This daily moisturiser features two known skin pick-me-ups in the shape of brightening vitamin C and energising, revitalising guarana.
It has a pleasant smell, offers lasting hydration and the chemical sunscreen is a great addition – adding protection against the sun’s rays all year round.
The finish is slightly silky rather than full matte but, if anything, that actually improves the look of skin – especially if it’s a bit below par to begin with. A great, daily-use, skin refresher.
If you’re looking for a belt-and-braces approach to anti-ageing skincare, then a decent wrinkle-busting night cream is a product well worth having in your grooming kit, as it helps ensure you’re taking round-the-clock care of your skin.
The key ingredient here is retinol – a form of vitamin A that boosts collagen, improves skin tone and one that’s best used at night when skin is in repair mode. The downside of retinol is that it can be drying and, if used in too strong a strength, may cause irritation. Luckily, we didn’t experience any problems with this carefully crafted night cream, which features time-release retinol, and skin felt – and looked – a little better after a couple of weeks’ use.
On the downside, this product is quite pricey, you have to stick with it (retinol’s benefits only really appear with continuous use) and since the main ingredient can make skin sensitive to sunlight, it’s important to apply a moisturiser with a sunscreen during the daytime. That said, if you want to up the ante when it comes to anti-ageing skincare, this a great place to start.
The most lightweight of all the creams we tried (it has a texture a bit like a soufflé), this anti-ageing product from acclaimed American dermatologist Dr. Nicholas Perricone has been specifically designed for the neck area.
Packed with anti-ageing essentials – including skin-brightening vitamin C, dark-spot minimising vitamin B3, a decent SPF25 sunscreen and alpha lipoic acid to minimise the appearance of fine lines – it was absorbed into the skin in an instant.
The neck area is one that most men forget about when practising a skincare routine, and yet it can betray age just as much as the face if not looked after. So, if you’re serious about your skincare, tackle that “turkey neck” by adding this little wonder to your daily routine.
We gave Nivea Men’s anti-age power 2-in-1 moisturiser SPF30 our best overall accolade based on a mixture of formulation and affordability, but we also highly rate Murad’s city skin age defense broad spectrum SPF50.
If you’ve the cash to splash, though, Dr Dennis Gross’ cult anti-ageing cream is a sound investment. Think of it as an insurance policy for your face.
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