Best Men’s Face Wash in 2019-Ultimate Review and Buyer’s Guide
You might have hit 30 and suddenly started worrying that the world deems you old, what’s with the saggy eye bags, unsightly acne, ugly razor bumps, and even the onset of wrinkles.
You feel like your best years are permanently behind you and you start pointing to the junk food, the sweet tooth and perhaps smoking.
But do you know that the cause is none other than your old friend bar soap?
Traditional bar soaps strip your skin of the much needed natural oils, imbalance the pH, and they also introduce harmful chemicals to your skin.
Fact check:
You can’t avoid the stresses of modern life and what you need is the right facial cleanser to revitalize your skin. With this regimen, your 40 will suddenly be your new 30.
Ditch that harmful bar soap and get the best facial cleanser for men today.
In our review, a high price does not always equate to quality and cheap is expensive is a deadbeat cliché. When it comes to your precious skin, the focus should be on quality and not quantity or price.
Read on to discover the best men’s face wash
Coming up after the review is a buyer’s guide for this facial skin care product for men and how to use it.
Top 10 Best men’s face washes
1. RUGGED & DAPPER – Facial Cleanser for Men
RUGGED premium quality all-in-one face wash is an amazing product rated for “best face wash for men”, meaning this is what thousands of buyers are going for.
Features
- Natural and organic ingredients
- Multipurpose use
- Anti-ageing best face washes for men
- Applicable to all skin types
- Large 8-ounce bottle can last for months with daily use
- Relatively pricey
2. L’Oréal Men’s Face Wash Cleanser
Your life in the city is characterized by dirt, fumes, dust, scorching sun amid the hard work to fight for your chance. Paris based L’Oreal Expert Hydra Energetic Charcoal Cream Cleanser is your perfect companion for a clean and supple skin all through this bustle.
Features
- Fights all the city grime effects on your face skin
- Also one of the best face wash for African American skin
- Good scent that is neither too strong nor feminine
- Low price
- Contains some inorganic ingredients
- Not very good for dry skin
- Charcoal will stain light colored face towel
3. NIVEA Men Sensitive Face Wash
If you have a sensitive skin (a skin that is prone to irritation such as redness, inflammation or itching), then you need a gentle face cleanser that won’t dry your skin and the perfect match is Nivea.
Features
Size: 5 fl. oz. Length of bottle: 5.6”
- Best facial cleanser for sensitive skin-improves sensitive skin’s defense over time
- Contains natural extracts with antiseptic and antibacterial qualities
- Lasts long since only a small dab is needed at a go
- Contains inorganic compounds that can irritate the eye
- Reviewers have given differing experiences with its scent
4. Lather & Wood’s Face Scrub
Lather & Wood’s men’s facial scrub is the best candidate when it comes to regenerating your skin after the rigors of being a man while letting you feel masculine.
Features
Size; 4 fl oz.
- Men’s only product with masculine scent
- Best men’s face exfoliator for all skin types
- Best natural face wash for combination skin
- Natural premium formula
- Pricey
- The jojoba beads maybe irritating to some sensitive skins
5. Kyoku for Men Exfoliating Facial Scrub
Japanese at its best, Kyoku’s award-winning men’s face scrub is your best bet for looking good today and slowing down the worrisome formation of wrinkles as you age.
Features
Size: 3.4 fl oz Length of bottle: 4.9”
- Advanced Japanese facial scrub technology
- Slows down wrinkle formation
- Best acne treatment for men
- A facial toner for men that guards against harmful bacteria and toxins
- Pricey
6. Thrive Natural Face Scrub for Men
If you are looking for a product that lets you own the day whether you want to go swimming, skating in the streets, sporting, dancing and whatever next, then look no further. Thrive’s all-natural invigorating scrub for men is made of unique plant-based exfoliants that revitalize and reenergize your facial skin no matter what it has faced.
Features
- 100% natural
- Certified by Whole Foods Market as Premium BodyCare, their highest ranking for effective and safe products
- Vegan safe and cruelty free
- Unique and highly effective medicinal ingredients
- 100% satisfaction guarantee
- Hard to squeeze scrub out of tube especially towards its end
7. Brickell Men’s Purifying Charcoal Face Wash
Josh Meyer & Matt Bolduc created Brickell best men’s face wash in 2014 out of necessity, for the market lacked a premium men’s skincare and grooming product that is all natural and that an everyday man of any age could relate with.
Features
Size: 8 Fl. Oz. Bottle length: 7.8”
- 100% natural and contains highly effective activated charcoal
- Best face wash for men with sensitive and dry skin
- Only a small dab is needed and can last for 60 days
- Not appropriate for oily skin
- Some users find the scent to be strong
- A bit pricey
8. Cetaphil Men Daily Face Wash
Cetaphil face wash has been innovating skin care solutions since 1947 and this is one of the best products for cleansing, moisturizing and protecting your skin without the irritation of other face cleansers.
Features
Size: 8 Fl. Oz. Bottle length: 6.2”
- Dermatologist Recommended best drugstore facial cleanser
- Best mens facial moisturizers with skin’s natural moisture barrier guard
- Deep cleans skin without irritation
- Suitable for all skin types
- A bit pricey
9. Anthony Glycolic Exfoliating and Resurfacing Wipes
Features
- A must-have face cleanser for your travel or gym bag
- Suitable for all skin types, men and women
- Packaged in an easy to open pouch
- Methanol causes dryness thus a moisturizer is needed
- A bit pricey
10. CeraVe Hydrating Facial Cleanser
As a man with a dry skin, the last thing your skin would want is something that comes to take away even a speck of its scarce moisture and CeraVe is perfectly formulated with this in mind.
Features
Size: 16 Fl. Oz. Bottle length: 7.6”
- Contains essential ceramides vital for your skin cells
- Ideal facial cleanser for dry to normal skin
- Best facial moisturizer for men that regenerates natural skin protective barrier
- Incredibly price friendly
- Difficult to squeeze out of bottle
A Buyer’s Guide for Men’s Face Wash
(i) Know your type of skin
The type of face cleanser that you should use largely depends on your type of skin, and this should fall into one of the five skin types: dry, oily, normal, sensitive, and combination.
Dry skin
You have a dry skin if your skin lacks enough moisture in the epidermis (topmost skin layer). While it affects both genders almost equally, most people tend to develop dry skin as they age due to diminishing ability to produce natural oils and lubricants. For some, a dry skin may be inconspicuous while for others it causes a fine and dry powdery appearance on the skin, irritation, and itchiness as well as flaks. If yours is a such a condition, then you need to avoid a harsh face soap and chemical cleansers; instead go for a face wash that will cleanse dirt, grime, radiant and other impurities without breaking down your skin lipids (the natural skin protective layer). If you can get a facial cleanser formulated with hydrating compounds, the better.
Oily skin
If you have an oily face skin, your skin oil glands produce too much oil and your face appears shiny a couple hours after washing it. Although oil is meant to protect to your skin from impurities and trap moisture, the excess oil clogs your skin pores and mixes with dirt, dead skin cells and ingrown hair to produce pimples, blackheads and razor bumps. To handle this, you need a face cleanser with an ingredient to magnetically remove excess oils and impurities from the pores without affecting your skin moisture levels. Avoid regular face soaps as they are highly alkaline and will strip your skin’s natural acid film that protects the skin from bacteria and viruses.
Besides, train yourself not to pick or squeeze pimples and look for products labeled ‘noncomedogenic’ (meaning it won’t clog your skin pores)
Normal skin
For a normal skin, everything from the moisture, oil and pH are balanced- not too much and not too little. There are no visible pores, flaks, redness and other imperfections, and the skin is neither sensitive nor shiny. With this type of skin you are free to try the different facial skincare products as long it doesn’t leave you dry.
Sensitive skin
A sensitive skin is characterized by redness, itching and irritation, burns whenever you are in the sun, swimming, in the city grime or after having a razor cut.
If yours is such a skin, you would want to avoid facial washes with alcohol or methanol as they irritate you. You also need a cleanser with creamy and anti-inflammatory plant extracts in order to soothe the rashes.
Combination skin
This skin type combines all or some of the other skin types in different sections, such as an oily nose, forehead and chin, but normal or dry cheeks. The different areas need a slightly different care and the best you can do is to find a washer that is gentle on all conditions or a combination of different cleansers. For instance, you may need to start with a light and water-soluble cleanser on the oily areas and then use a creamy moisturizer on the dry areas.
Check this video and know your skin type
(ii) Choose between the different cleansers
Having acknowledged your skin type and the appropriate skin care ingredients, the next question you would want to ask yourself is whether to go for a facial scrub, wash, cleanser or toner?
Face wash vs cleanser
Face washer and cleaners have much in common in that they are both used to rid your face of dirt, grime, oils and impurities. Their difference is that a face wash is foaming and therefore you need to rinse it, while a cleanser is non-foaming and doesn’t need to be washed away.
Due to foaming, a face wash dissolves much better in pores removing debris and is most appropriate when you have been out in the dust or pollution for long. In such a case you would want to use a cleanser first to dissolve excess oils and then use the face wash.
Face Scrub
Unlike face wash and cleanser that are lighter and are meant to clean the skin surface, the face scrub is thicker and contains abrasives (grit) that unclog pores and scrubs off dead skin cells.
Due to their gritty texture, it is not meant for daily use and you should use it at most twice a week.
Face Tonic
Unlike the face wash and cleanser which are used to clean, a face toner is a leave-on product that you can apply on your face after washing or shaving to provide healing and soothing to the irritated skin, restore pH balance.
How to use men’s face washer
Having chosen the best face cleanser for your skin type and needs, how to use it is an easy 1-2-3 procedure, not much more than the bar soap you have been used to.
But you have to use the face wash at the right time and the right manner.
First, it is recommendable to wash in the morning and evening, since this is the time your skin has accumulated sweat, oil, and impurities.
Secondly, you need to ditch the recklessness you’ve had with water when washing with a bar soap. Cold water tightens your pores preventing unclogging while how water accelerates the loss of moisture. Lukewarm water strikes a balance between the two and this is what you need.
(i) Wet your face with warm water
(ii) Squeeze a dab of the face wash or cleanser into the palm of your hand and rub it in in order to lather and activate the formula
(iii) Gently massage the formula onto your face and neck while avoiding your eyes. Leave for 1-2 minutes to dissolve the oils
(iv) Rinse your face thoroughly with lukewarm water and wipe with a clean towel