Pregnancy face care, trimester by trimester

Pregnancy face care comes down to four things: cleanse gently, treat one concern at a time, moisturise properly and protect your skin from the sun. What changes across pregnancy is not the number of steps but where the emphasis sits, because your skin does not have the same needs at 8 weeks as it does at 34. This guide is part of The Pregnancy Skincare Guide, and it helps to read it alongside how skin changes during pregnancy.

What does pregnancy face care actually need to do?

A pregnancy routine has three jobs: keep your skin barrier intact, stay ahead of pigmentation and use only ingredients considered appropriate in pregnancy.

Most women arrive at pregnancy with a routine already built for a different set of goals. The instinct is to add products. The better move is usually to subtract, then rebuild around those three jobs.

Pregnancy brings well documented changes to the skin, including increased pigmentation, changes in oil production and shifts in how well the skin holds moisture.¹ These are normal physiological changes rather than problems, and a good routine works with them.

Australian clinical guidance from MotherSafe confirms that the great majority of cosmetic skincare is appropriate during pregnancy and breastfeeding, with a short and specific list of exceptions.² So this is not a matter of starting again. It is a matter of removing two or three things and being more deliberate about the rest.

How your skin changes across pregnancy

Three measurable changes shape what your routine should do, and they do not all arrive at once.

The first is barrier function. A longitudinal study measured water loss through the skin at 3 points during pregnancy and 3 points afterwards, and it rose at every single visit.³ A 2025 prospective study found the same pattern, with water loss and skin roughness both increasing while the actual water content of the skin stayed unchanged.⁴ Your skin is not becoming dehydrated. It is becoming less good at holding what it has.

The second is pigment. Melasma is one of the most common skin changes in pregnancy and typically becomes visible from the second trimester, driven by hormonal change and sun exposure together.⁵˒⁶

The third is breakouts. Acne affects up to 43% of pregnant women, and inflammatory lesions are reported most often in the second and third trimesters.⁷

Three curves, three different timings. That is why a single flat routine rarely fits the whole nine months.

How to build your routine trimester by trimester

What should your skincare routine be in the first trimester?

In the first trimester, strip your routine back and keep it short. This is the audit stage, not the treatment stage.

Remove anything on the avoid list, particularly retinoids, and put your effort into a routine you can actually keep up while you are tired or nauseated.² Fragrance can also become harder to tolerate in these weeks, which is a practical reason to simplify rather than a safety one.

Three products is enough here: a gentle cleanser, a moisturiser and a sunscreen. If breakouts have already started, pimples in early pregnancy covers what is happening and what helps.

A gentle cleanser for pregnancy built around mandelic acid and gluconolactone keeps oil in check without the stripping feeling that sets the barrier back. The First Trimester Kit is built for exactly this stage.

What should change in the second trimester?

The second trimester is when pigment protection matters most, so this is the point to make sun protection non-negotiable and add a brightening step.

Melasma most often appears now, and sun exposure is the strongest modifiable factor in whether it develops.⁵˒⁶ The evidence for prevention is unusually good. In a study of 200 women who began using a broad spectrum sunscreen in early pregnancy, melasma developed in 2.7% over 12 months, against an expected rate of around 53% in a comparable group.⁸

Daily broad spectrum SPF 50 is the single highest value habit in pregnancy face care. Reapply it, and wear a hat when you are outside for long.

Alongside it, niacinamide with N-acetyl glucosamine has evidence for reducing the appearance of facial pigmentation.⁹ Both sit in the vitamin C serum for pregnancy and the serum for pigmentation during pregnancy.

What does your skin need in the third trimester?

In the third trimester, shift the emphasis to barrier repair, because this is when dryness, tightness and rough texture are usually at their most noticeable.

Water loss through the skin is at its highest point of the pregnancy by now and keeps climbing after birth.³ The response is not more water. It is giving the barrier the materials it is short of.

Ceramides are the closest match to the problem. In a randomised study, a moisturiser containing a ceramide precursor lowered water loss through the skin and reduced visible dryness after four weeks.¹⁰ Glycerin and squalane work alongside them, which is how the moisturiser during pregnancy in the nātelle range is built.

One thing to raise with your doctor rather than treat at home: new itching in the second half of pregnancy without a visible rash, especially on the palms and soles or worse at night.¹¹ It is checked with a simple blood test.

What about skincare after birth?

After birth, keep the same barrier focus for a few months, because this is when your skin is measurably at its driest.

In the longitudinal study, water loss through the skin peaked around two months after delivery, with a meaningful share of women reading well above the normal range at that point.³ Average readings had returned to normal by 6 months.³

This is worth knowing in advance, because it lands in the weeks when you have the least capacity to think about skincare. Consistency with two or three products beats adding new ones.

Pigmentation often fades slowly over the months after birth, though it can persist, and daily sun protection remains the thing that decides how well it settles.⁵ Most cosmetic skincare remains appropriate while breastfeeding.² The Postpartum Kit is built around barrier recovery and brightening for this window.

Which ingredients are appropriate during pregnancy?

Most cosmetic skincare ingredients are appropriate during pregnancy, and the useful ones fall into four groups.

For hydration and barrier repair: glycerin, ceramides, squalane, panthenol and hyaluronic acid during pregnancy.¹⁰˒¹²

For pigmentation: niacinamide, N-acetyl glucosamine and vitamin C. The niacinamide and N-acetyl glucosamine combination has strong evidence behind it for reducing the appearance of dark patches.⁹

For breakouts and texture: mandelic acid and gluconolactone, which are gentler options than the acids most people reach for.²

For fine lines: bakuchiol, which performed comparably to retinol on photoageing in a randomised double blind trial without retinol's pregnancy restrictions.¹³ You can read more on bakuchiol during pregnancy or find it in the bakuchiol serum during pregnancy.

Which ingredients should you stop using while pregnant?

The hard exclusions are retinoids, hydroquinone, high strength salicylic acid and strong professional peels.

Topical retinoids, including retinol, tretinoin and adapalene, are avoided in pregnancy and oral isotretinoin is contraindicated outright.²˒¹⁴ This is the one exclusion that is not debated.

Hydroquinone is avoided because a comparatively large share of it is absorbed through the skin, so Australian guidance is to use alternatives for pigmentation in pregnancy.²

Salicylic acid is best left out of leave-on products, though incidental amounts in a rinse-off wash are not a cause for concern.² Strong professional peels are worth postponing for the same reason, which is dose rather than any evidence of harm.

Everything else in a typical routine, including cleansers, moisturisers, most serums and sunscreen, can stay.²

The full list, with the reasoning behind each one, is in skincare ingredients to avoid during pregnancy.

A simple morning and night routine for pregnancy

Keep it to three or four steps and do them consistently. That beats a longer routine you abandon in the third trimester.

In the morning, cleanse or simply rinse, apply an antioxidant serum, moisturise, then finish with broad spectrum SPF 50. The sunscreen is the step to protect if you are short on time or energy.

At night, a good night skincare routine for pregnancy is even simpler. Cleanse properly to remove sunscreen and the day, apply one treatment serum, then moisturise.

Change one thing at a time and give it 6-8 weeks. Pregnancy skin changes on its own timeline, and if you swap three products at once you will not know what did the work.

If you are unsure where to start, the trimester kits are sequenced to the changes described above, so the routine moves with you rather than staying still.

This article is intended as general educational information and does not constitute medical advice. Always consult your healthcare provider or dermatologist before making changes to your skincare routine during pregnancy.