UK Facial Skincare Ingredient and Format Trends: 2025
"Alongside long-standing confusion, ingredient fatigue, frustration and scepticism are emerging. Meanwhile, niche formats are coming to the forefront."
Samantha Dover, Global Beauty Analyst
- In the UK, 72% of facial skincare users think brands use ingredients to encourage consumers to buy products they don’t need. This suggests, combined with ongoing confusion about what various actives do for the skin, consumers are growing sceptical of ingredient-led innovation – proving that a shift towards slow, purposeful NPD could be wise to sustain brand trust among consumers.
- Alongside ingredient scrutiny, the rise of beauty devices and professional treatments are the biggest threats to the facial skincare market in the UK. Although still niche, both devices and treatments are becoming essential within the facial skincare routines of some of the most engaged consumers. As a result, there is a risk that increasing device/treatment use could cannibalise sales within certain segments.
- One of the biggest opportunities in the UK facial skincare category is to boost the use of overlooked formats. This approach will increase consumer repertoires and value sales – particularly as the renewed interest in K-Beauty has proven consumers are willing to embrace multistep routines. However, efficacy and sensoriality will be important to ensure that acquisition translates into repeat purchasing.
This Report Looks at the Following Areas:
- Strategies to sustain the strong value sales growth seen in the facial skincare category in recent years
- Opportunities to boost consumer interest in and usage of niche facial skincare formats
- How climate change and demographic trends will shape demand
- Shifts in consumer attitudes towards active ingredients and ingredient-led NPD
- Mintel’s predictions for which products consumers will turn to when layering facial skincare in future
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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
- What you need to know
- The outlook for facial skincare ingredients and formats
- Opportunities
- Sustain market growth by exploring new layering trends
- Future-proof innovation by addressing the rise in ingredient scrutiny
- Revive facial mask usage by targeting a new generation of anti-acne skincare users
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THE MARKET
- Go beyond facial skincare essentials
- Cater to risk-averse consumers by elevating hero ingredients and formats
- Graph 1: CPI inflation rate and total pay growth rate, 2021-25
- Maximise brand and product appeal with inclusive innovation
- Respond to device trends in NPD
- Encourage patience at a time when social media is testing it
- Demand for fast-acting actives will grow as ingredient literacy improves
- Future-proof supply chains while meeting consumer interest in responsibly sourced ingredients
- Graph 2: sustainability features that most interest consumers when choosing beauty/grooming products, 2025
- Pay attention to rising demand for climate-adaptive skincare
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THE CONSUMER
- Facial skincare usage trends
- Usage is driven by daily essentials
- Price and sustainability influence mask format preferences
- Graph 3: types of facial masks used in the last 12 months, 2025
- Facial mists are performing well, despite their non-essential nature in skincare routines
- Consumers are embracing lip balm wardrobes
- Graph 4: types of lip treatments used in the last 12 months, by age, 2025
- Barriers to facial mask usage
- Formulate with combination skin in mind
- Graph 5: reasons for not using a facial mask in the last 12 months, by gender, 2025
- Rising use of spot treatments threaten mask sales
- Prove efficacy with transformative textures
- Motivations behind facial mist usage
- Tap into skin health priorities with layering mists
- Graph 6: factors that drove facial mist usage in the last 12 months, 2025
- Graph 7: factors that can boost interest in facial mist usage, 2025
- Cooling sensations can draw new consumers to the mist segment
- Further explore the crossover with makeup
- Features sought in lip treatments
- Consumers are turning to lip care for comfort
- Target lip mask users with aesthetic claims
- Graph 8: features sought in lip treatments in the last 12 months, by types of lip treatments used, 2025
- Create lip layering kits to boost format repertoires
- Attitudes towards facial skincare ingredients
- Concerns about the use of ingredients to drive overconsumption are arising
- Consumers gravitate towards potent formulas
- Brands can go further to advise on tolerance
- Pay attention to ingredient innovation from leading brands in the men’s category
- Call out more actives front of pack
- Benefits associated with facial skincare ingredients
- Consumers are beginning to grasp ingredient basics
- Address the far-reaching impact of patchy ingredient knowledge
- A potential shift away from ingredient-first marketing
- Explore new ways to prove efficacy in anti-acne skincare
- Graph 9: benefits associated with select facial skincare ingredients, 2025
- Peptide innovation could boost consumer interest in the ingredient
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PRODUCT, INNOVATION AND MARKETING
- Focus of BPC moves away from facial skincare
- Graph 10: share of BPC launches accounted for by facial skincare products, 2015-25
- Lip care success proves a new innovation cycle is emerging
- Serum launches need a stronger USP
- Graph 11: share of facial skincare launches accounted for by serums, 2015-25
- Trending textures are easy on the eye
- Hypochlorous acid mists emerge as a new facial skincare staple
- Niacinamide needs a TV campaign to boost consumer interest
- Brands are elevating hero actives
- More brands are calling out ingredient patents
- Quantify ingredient patents on-pack to differentiate
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APPENDIX
- Report scope
- The consumer
- Consumer research questions
- Consumer research methodology
- Repertoire analysis methodology
- UK generation groups
- Other methodologies
- Mintel Spark
- Abbreviations
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