Do You Really Need a 10-Step Routine?

There are two camps online, and both are shouting. One says more steps means more results — serums layered under serums, an essence you can't quite explain, a routine that takes twenty minutes and looks impressive in a "get ready with me" video. The other says skincare is a con and all you need is water and sunscreen.

The actual research sits in the middle, which is less exciting but more useful.

Studies on multi-step regimens — cleanser, treatment serums, moisturizer, sunscreen, used consistently over several weeks — do show measurable improvements in things like hyperpigmentation and fine lines, particularly when the products are layering genuinely different active ingredients (a retinoid plus a separate antioxidant plus a separate sunscreen, for example) rather than five versions of the same thing. That's a real finding, not marketing spin.

At the same time, dermatology research on the skin barrier tells a different story: over-cleansing and stacking too many actives at once — retinoids, exfoliating acids, and vitamin C all in the same week, say — is one of the more common ways people damage their barrier and end up with the redness and sensitivity they were trying to treat in the first place. Simplified routines, used consistently, are frequently associated with fewer flare-ups and better long-term comfort, especially for anyone with reactive or sensitive skin.

So "how many steps" isn't really the right question. The better one is: does each product in your routine have a job, and is your skin tolerating the total load of actives you're using? A four-step routine with the right actives can outperform a ten-step one with redundant ones. And a ten-step routine can work fine — if your barrier can handle it and nothing in it is fighting with anything else.

This is the whole reason we build routines around what your skin can actually tolerate, not a fixed number of steps.