Skin problems aren’t just physical. They’re highly emotional. There’s nothing like a big zit or patch of eczema to steal your confidence right when you have a big speech to give or a date to impress. A trip to the dermatologist can be expensive, and perusing the skin care aisle at your local pharmacy can feel overwhelming. But what if the answer to your skinpocalypse was in your teabag? Lucky for us, what’s inside tea—notably, antioxidants—gives your favorite drink a ton of dermatological benefits. Same goes for tea-infused topicals like facemasks and pastes. The skincare boost you’ve been looking for may already be in your cabinet!
Here’s why, briefly:
Tea contains antioxidants. That’s one of those words everybody uses, but what does it really mean? Your body contains something called “free radicals.” These are toxic atoms or molecules that damage cells by oxidizing them, which impedes their ability to function properly and ultimately causes annoying problems like acne and other fun skin problems. But antioxidants work against free radicals by making them to non-toxic. Basically, they cancel out the bad stuff free radicals do, getting rid of your zits and reducing your risk for skin cancer along the way.
Since tea contains antioxidants, it’s an ideal beverage to boost your skin’s health and appearance. Here’s how a few of our favorite teas can improve your skin:
1) Green Tea
Green tea decreases age-related skin inflammation and protects against sunburns. Plus, it reduces dark under-eye patches. When used as a topical in mask form, green tea exfoliates skin and reduces excess oil. Buh-bye shine, hello beautiful, radiant skin. For another trick, try splashing cold green tea directly on your face and watching your large pores shrink right before your eyes. Green tea’s also known to fight acne. Look for products containing at least 1% ECGG (an antioxidant in green tea) and your zits won’t know what hit ‘em. And did we mention consuming green tea fights cancer? What a showoff.
2) Chamomile
People have been using chamomile tea to treat skin problems since the days of the ancient Egyptian and Roman empires. Chamomile tea’s great for fighting dry, patchy skin and inflammatory conditions like rashes and acne. It can also be used to diminish the appearance of pesky acne scars. You can even use a cold chamomile tea bag as a compress to soothe and minimize bug bites. Who knew?
3) Oolong Tea
Feeling younger than you look? An oolong-infused paste can reduce wrinkles, dark spots, and age spots.
4) Kombucha
As we age, our skin naturally gets less elastic. But kombucha improves your skin’s elasticity, giving you a more youthful appearance by reducing lines and wrinkles.
5) Ginger Tea
Patchy, uneven skin got you down? Try drinking ginger tea, known to reduce uneven skin tone. And you thought you needed makeup for that!
7) Oregon Grape Tea
Your gut and your skin are pretty well connected. Oftentimes, a problem in your intestines shows up on your face. Oregon Grape tea contains herbs that detoxify the liver and kidneys, helping clear up the root causes of problems like eczema, acne, psoriasis, and other inflammatory issues.
8) Burdock Root Tea
Burdock removes waste from cells inside the liver, kidney, gall bladder, and lymph system, eradicating the toxins that would otherwise build up and cause perspiration, which in turn causes a bevy of skin problems like acne and eczema. Burdock tea starts acts at the cellular level and works from the inside out to keep your body from becoming overridden with bad stuff that eventually shows itself as a rash, pimple, boil, or carbuncle.
