Tocopherol
Tocopherol · INCI Tocopherol
Vitamin E is one of the few ingredients almost everyone has heard of, and most of what they have heard is wrong. Here is what it is doing in our formulas, starting with the job nobody puts on a front label.
Its first job is looking after the oils, not your skin. That is a less exciting sentence than the one on most labels, and it is the true one.
What it is
Our formulas are built on oils that are rich in polyunsaturated fatty acids. That is the point of them: linoleic acid is what the skin's barrier is made from, and the oils that carry the most of it are the ones worth having. The catch is that the same chemistry makes those oils reactive. Left alone, they oxidise, and an oxidised oil is no good to anyone.
Tocopherol is what stops that. It is a sacrificial antioxidant: it intercepts the reactive molecules that would otherwise start the chain reaction, and is used up in the process. That is why it is in every formula we make, and why a little more comes in with our bladderwrack, which is infused in an oil that already carries some.
It also does something for your skin, and we do not want to undersell it. Vitamin E is a genuine antioxidant on the skin as well as in the bottle, defending the lipids of your barrier from oxidative damage. That effect is real, quiet and cumulative, which is a fair description of most things that actually work.
What it does in our formulas
Two things, in order of how much they matter here.
It stops the oils turning
This is its main job, and the reason it is in every formula. Our oils are rich in polyunsaturated fatty acids, which is exactly what makes them good for your barrier and also what makes them prone to going rancid. Tocopherol takes the hit instead: it mops up the reactive molecules that would otherwise start that process. Without it, a rose hip or sunflower oil formula would not keep.
Well characterisedIt lends the skin some antioxidant defence
Vitamin E does genuinely work as an antioxidant on the skin, protecting the lipids of the barrier from oxidative damage. It is a real effect, cumulative rather than dramatic, and it sits alongside the antioxidants that come in with the oils themselves.
Emerging evidenceWhat the research does not show
And now the mythology, which in vitamin E's case is unusually stubborn.
Marketed as It heals scars and fades marks
Marketed as More vitamin E means better skin
So: a well-understood antioxidant that keeps our oils fresh and lends your skin a little defence of its own. That is worth having. It is not a miracle, and we would rather not sell it as one.
On the label and in the range
Tocopherol appears in every one of our formulations, in the middle of the ingredient list. A little extra arrives with the bladderwrack, which is infused in sunflower oil that carries its own tocopherol, and that is declared too. The exact percentage is published on each product page.
Is it suitable for me?
Vitamin E is well tolerated by most people and suits a vegan routine, with no restrictions under UK or EU cosmetic law. We have been careful with the suitability marks here, though, because vitamin E is one of the more common contact allergens among otherwise gentle ingredients, and the rate is small but real. That is why there is no sensitive-skin badge on this page. If your skin reacts easily, patch test first, and if you know you react to vitamin E, our products are not for you. We would rather tell you plainly.
Vitamin E causes contact allergy in a small number of people, more often than most of our ingredients. If your skin reacts easily, patch test first.
The research behind this page
We review the published literature. We do not conduct the studies below.
- Keen MA, Hassan I. Vitamin E in dermatology. Indian Dermatol Online J 2016;7(4):311-315. →
- Thiele JJ, Ekanayake-Mudiyanselage S. Vitamin E in human skin: organ-specific physiology and considerations for its use in dermatology. Mol Aspects Med 2007;28(5-6):646-667. →
- Baumann LS, Spencer J. The effects of topical vitamin E on the cosmetic appearance of scars. Dermatol Surg 1999;25(4):311-315. →