Everyone needs protection from the sun. You can benefit from sunscreen regardless of your skin tone.
But it can be hard to find a sunscreen without a white cast. There are certain factors people of color in particular need to consider to find their perfect sunscreen.
Sunscreen for Different Skin Tones
Sunscreen is a cosmetic compound that protects you from the sun’s rays and lowers your risk of skin cancer. Aside from staying inside or wearing clothing head-to-toe, sunscreen is your next best option to protect your skin.
People around the world still refuse to wear sunscreen despite the necessity. People of color are among that population, but not necessarily by choice.
The typical off-the-shelf sunscreen isn’t made for all skin tones. Sunscreen that’s considered safe has a strange effect on people of color: It temporarily changes their skin color, a change called a white cast.
A Little About Sunscreen
Sunscreens come in many forms, including oils, sprays, and gels. The most common types of sunscreen are lotions and creams.
The typical lotion sunscreen has two varieties that have massive differences.
Chemical sunscreens. Chemical sunscreens are formulated so that your skin absorbs them. The sunscreen chemicals cause a reaction in your skin when the sun hits it that protects you from harmful rays.
Physical, natural, or mineral sunscreens. Physical sunscreen has many names to differentiate it from chemical sunscreen. It uses the mineral ingredients titanium dioxide (TiO2) and zinc oxide (ZnO) instead of chemicals absorbed into the skin.
The minerals in the sunscreen chemicals sit on your skin and refract the sun’s rays. They form a protective layer on top of your skin rather than in your skin.
Sunscreen White Cast
Most sunscreens are intended to be transparent or faintly white. When applied on lighter skin, sunscreen is invisible to the naked eye.
The white tint in the sunscreen doesn’t blend with darker skin and can make their skin appear slightly white, purple, or blue. This tinting is called a white cast or bluing.
Why Does Sunscreen Leave a White Cast?
Not all sunscreen leaves a white cast. The culprit is physical sunscreen.
Physical sunscreen is made of tiny titanium dioxide and zinc oxide particles that sit on your skin. When sunlight hits them, they reflect the light.
For people with lighter skin, this isn’t a problem — the lightness of the physical sunscreen blends in easily.
The illuminated mineral particles in the sunscreen stand out for people with darker skin. This causes their skin to appear lighter or discolored.
As there was concern about the health impact of chemical sunscreens, there was a shift toward physical sunscreens. Because many physical sunscreens cause white casts, the available options for people of color can be more limited.
How to Choose a Sunscreen
Sunscreen selection is more complicated than choosing a spray or lotion. If you're a person of color, you have to get down to the microscopic level.
Choosing a chemical sunscreen. Chemical sunscreens don’t typically leave a white cast since they’re absorbed into your skin.
The FDA recently approved bemotrizinol (Parsol Shield), a chemical UV filter, to be added as an active ingredient into sunscreens. It absorbs into the skin at lower levels versus other chemical sunscreen ingredients, and also protects against UVA and UVB rays.
The downside of some chemical sunscreens is that they can cause a reaction people with skin sensitivities. Unless you know precisely which sunscreen chemicals irritate your skin and are willing to scour the ingredients, you might be better off searching for an effective physical sunscreen.
Choosing a physical sunscreen. The two mineral ingredients in physical sunscreens are microscopic particles as small as 10 nanometers. But titanium dioxide and zinc oxide aren’t the same when it comes to darker skin.
Titanium dioxide refracts more light than zinc oxide and causes more of a white cast. Choosing physical sunscreens that only have zinc oxide can help to avoid a white cast.
Luckily, zinc oxide has only a few known side effects, including the occasional allergic reaction. So, choosing zinc-heavy sunscreens shouldn’t cause problems.
Since zinc oxide refracts less light, the sunscreen needs more of it to have the same SPF as a sunscreen that has both zinc oxide and titanium dioxide.
When choosing a sunscreen with only zinc oxide, it should be 15% to 20% zinc oxide with particles that are 20 to 30 nanometers.
Choosing a Sunscreen for Different Skin Tones
Everyone’s skin tone is different, and zinc oxide sunscreens may still leave a minor white cast for some people. Another option is getting a tinted sunscreen. In addition to UV filters, tinted sunscreens have a combination of yellow, red, and black iron oxides and non-nanosized titanium dioxide pigment (white in color). These pigments add color to the sunscreen to help to prevent a white cast.
There are a great variety of tinted physical sunscreens in many different shades that you can buy in stores or online.
If you have darker skin, UV rays from the sun can cause hyperpigmentation, a condition that causes dark patches or spots on your skin. If you have a darker skin tone, look for products that contain iron oxide concentration of at least three percent to prevent darkening of your skin.
Using Your Sunscreen Without a White Cast
If you’ve found the perfect sunscreen that doesn't leave a white cast, you want to make sure it lasts.
Applying sunscreen. Apply your sunscreen 15 minutes before going out. You should cover your entire face and any visible skin on your body.
You need to reapply sunscreen after you dry off from swimming or if you’re sweating a lot. If you’re not swimming or sweating, you should reapply after 2 hours.
Keep it cool. To make sure your perfect sunscreen lasts, keep it out of direct sunlight and in a cool area. When you head to the beach, wrap it in a towel in your bag or store it in the cooler so it doesn’t get hot.
Toss it. Your skin health is vital, and expired sunscreen won’t do you any favors. Replace your sunscreen when it expires or after three years.
Want to Skip the Sunscreen?
Getting sun exposure without sunscreen is not recommended. In addition to wearing sunscreen, you can also use the following ways to further protect your skin from the sun:
- Stay in the shade whenever you’re outside.
- Wear long shirts and pants to cover your skin.
- Wear wide-brimmed hats to protect your face.
- Wear sunglasses to shield the skin around your eyes.
Screen Your Sunscreen
Sunscreen is meant to keep your skin healthy and beautiful. Many people with lighter skin tones can grab a bottle of sunscreen off the shelf and be fine, but people of color should take a very close look at the ingredients in their sunscreen before committing.
