Tips for skin care

Is It Better to Wash Your Face With Cold Water or Warm Water?

 
Mary Smith
By Mary Smith. November 10, 2021
Is It Better to Wash Your Face With Cold Water or Warm Water?

Everyone has different skin, so it makes sense we should have different skincare regimens. What we use should be adapted to what we need in terms of balancing our skin. Some of us have dry skin, others have quite oily skin. We can purchase various creams, ointments and skincare products. However, everyone will need to wash our face with water during some point of our skin facial skin cleansing routine. Believe it or not, temperature might be just as important as the cosmetics or cleansers you use.

At oneHOWTO, we find out is it better to wash your face with cold water or warm water? By answering this question, you will better know how to treat your skin.

You may also be interested in: How to Wash Your Face with Apple Cider Vinegar

Contents

  1. Is it better to wash your face with cold, warm or hot water?
  2. When to wash your face with cold water
  3. When to wash your face with warm water
  4. When is it good to wash your face with hot water

Is it better to wash your face with cold, warm or hot water?

As with hair, the temperature of the water with which you clean your face matters. Sometimes, it matters a lot. Warm water for your hair is recommended to remove shampoo and conditioner effectively. You may use a stream of cold water to finish. This helps to prevent breakages and is advised for those with frizzy hair. However, washing skin is not the same as washing hair. For this reason, the temperature of water you use to clean your face is important.

Firstly, you should know if is not beneficial to your skin to change the water temperature depending on the season. This means you shouldn't wash your face in warm water because it is winter or vice versa for summer.

In general, extreme temperatures for water either hot or cold are not ideal for washing your face. Ideally, avoid very hot water and tend towards cool. However, different temperatures can benefit your skin in different ways. For this reason, we look at washing your face with cold water, washing your face with warm water and washing your face with hot water in more detail.

When to wash your face with cold water

Immersing the face in cold water has many benefits, so it may be recommended for your facial cleansing routine. Although warm water is ideal for most skin types, cold water can help to stimulate blood circulation, allows better of elimination of toxins through capillaries, prevent acne and firm up the skin. This is because colder temperatures help to reduce inflammation, something which can be increased with warm water.

However, washing your face with cold water only provides benefits when used in the correct way. The ideal way to wash your face is to:

  • Wet your face with warm water.
  • Use your facial cleanser of choice.
  • Wash the cleanser off with more warm water.
  • Splash your face with cold water.
  • Moisturize with the moisturizer best suited for your skin.

By washing your face with warm water, you open the pores of your skin. You can then clean these pores with your cleanser and then use more warm water to ensure the pores are cleaned out. By then washing your face again with cold water, you close up the pores without trapping any cleanser in there and preventing moisturizer to clog pores.

When to wash your face with warm water

As we have pointed out previously, the option of washing your face with warm water is the best option for most of us. As with hair, using warm water and finishing with cold will allow you to get the benefits of both temperatures and give your skin better care.

However, warm water is necessary for some procedures. If you have been using heavy makeup or have some material on your face you need to remove, using cold water exclusively will not help as much. The warmer temperature will help to breakdown the compounds found in makeup and make it easier to wash away with the cleanser. You can then use cold water again at the end to close the pores.

Warm water is the best temperature for cleaning your face if you are prone to acne.

When is it good to wash your face with hot water

In most cases, you shouldn't use hot water. Of course you should never use boiling water or water which is so hot it will burn you. But even if your skin can tolerate it, hot water is usually too strong for our facial skin.

The only time you should use hot water is when you need to remove something on your face which is difficult to come off. This can be the case if you have something stuck to your skin, you have used very heavy makeup or something has put something semi-permanent on your skin such as marker pen. The higher temperatures of hot water or steam can really open up the pores and expedite the removal of these substances.

Although hot water can be used for a deep cleansing, it will also likely dehydrate your skin if you are not careful. Do not use it regularly and ensure your moisturize well afterwards. The hot water will have remove much of the natural oils in your skin, so moisturizing helps encourage sebum development. This is especially the case if you have sensitive skin to begin with.

If you want to know the best facial skincare routine for you, check out our article on how to wash your face properly everyday. If you want to see what other facial treatments are available, you can check out our articles on how often to use a face peel and how often should you get a facial.

If you want to read similar articles to Is It Better to Wash Your Face With Cold Water or Warm Water?, we recommend you visit our Beauty & Personal Care category.

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Is It Better to Wash Your Face With Cold Water or Warm Water?