Jul 12, 2024
Things I love about summer in Japan: quality sunscreen options
It's important to wear sunscreen year-round, but I always feel it's extra important during the summer months -- there are often higher UV index figures, and just more hours of daylight to contend with! Growing up, I hated wearing sunscreen because formulations felt so sticky and uncomfortable, but that's definitely not the case with sunscreens in Japan.
I find that sunscreens here absorb really well (even my kids don't complain with applying them), with a lot of them having gel-style formulations instead of thicker lotion ones. Some that I've encountered even have things like hyaluronic acid in their formulations, which has added skin benefits.
Some of my favorite sunscreens lately -- they can be found at most drugstores or online!
I also appreciate that each of these bottles were under 1000 yen each, which I think represents good value for money when you take into account the quality.
Do you have any favorite sunscreen brands here in Japan? Have you noticed a difference in the quality of sunscreens here compared to what you might be used to back home?
2 Comments
BlueButterfly
on Jul 12
I also noticed that the sunscreen here is not sticky at all and is really pleasant to apply. I can also compare it well because I come from the country of NIVEA (Germany) and use the same brand here. There really is a huge difference. I strongly suspect that the brand has simply adapted to the humid weather in Asia. However, I generally find the sunscreen bottles in Japan to be incredibly small. If you have to put sunscreen on the whole family every day, you really need so many bottles, which is really annoying.
genkidesu
on Jul 12
@BlueButterfly I definitely agree about the size, too...I am used to having large bottles of around 500ml back home, sometimes you can even get bigger pump packs of around 1 liter! I don't really see many sunscreens above the 150ml mark here so that's a frustrating point for sure.