Slugging Skin: What to Know About the Dermatologist-Approved TikTok Beauty Trend

If you've ever dabbled in skin care and beauty TikTok, you will have probably come across a handful of terms related to slugging — from “slugging skin” to "Aquaphor slugging,” “eye slugging,” and many more.

Slugging Tok was once a mysterious corner of skin care, an even more mysterious word, but it's risen in popularity rapidly in the past few years, with more and more people Googling things like "how to slug your face” daily.

While the skin care technique has been making the rounds on the app in the last few years, its origins go way back. What is skin slugging, and what are the benefits of using this technique? so We asked some experts for the details, and we're breaking down everything from how the method differs according to skin type, how it works, where it came from, and what the downsides are.

→ What is slugging?
→ Benefits of slugging
→ Vaseline VS. Aquaphor
→ Downsides of slugging
→ Is slugging for everyone?
→ How to do slugging the right way
→ Skin slugging frequency
→ What I learned from trying slugging
→ Best products for skin slugging

Simply put, slugging skin is the process of sealing your skin with an occlusive agent, often petrolatum-based, usually overnight. If the idea of sleeping with Vaseline on your face doesn't sound appealing, you can also slug your skin during the day and leave the product on for a few hours. Though slugging skin has been popularized as a face treatment on TikTok to aid with hydration, this little beauty trick works on other parts of the body as well – from lips and eye slugging to ankle and elbow slugging.

As a trend, slugging's rising popularity can be traced back to the K-beauty world before hitting forums like Reddit's Skincare Addiction and later, of course, TikTok. Though it's been popularized again recently, it is a practice most dermatologists have long recommended for quickly healing dryness and eczema and trapping in your moisture, board-certified dermatologist Dr. Shari Marchbein, M.D., who made an entire Instagram Reels on slugging, tells Teen Vogue. “In truth, dermatologists have been ‘slugging’ for years. We just didn't come up with a cute name for it. I don't go to bed without it."

As Dr. Marchbein explains, There are three kinds of skin care ingredients that work together on the hydration front: humectants, emollients, and occlusives. Humectants bring moisture from your environment into the skin, emollients directly moisturize by filling in gaps in the skin, and occlusives create a barrier to keep hydration from evaporating off of the skin. Petrolatum, the ingredient commonly found in ointments like Aquaphor, CeraVe Healing Ointment, Vaseline, and other topical creams, is occlusive, meaning it creates a barrier that seals in hydration. There are other kinds of occlusives, too, like lanolin and butters.

For the most optimal way of slugging skin, Dr. Marchbein recommends using petrolatum on its own or thinly layered on top of a moisturizer or hydrating serum anywhere from your knees to your eyelids. She also agrees that the TikTok way of slugging – that is, putting "the teeniest dab," as she emphasized, over your entire face – can be a great solution for those with dry or sensitive skin. “Especially going into allergy season, my lips and my eyelids are the thinnest skin, and they can dry easily; slugging is a great way of treating that overnight.”

So, if you are incorporating slugging into your routine, the order should be: serum, moisturizer, and then petrolatum.

When researching slugging, you'll hear a lot about Aquaphor since it has a budget-friendly price tag and proven effectiveness, but Vaseline could also work for your skin type. The main difference between Vaseline and Aquaphor is that the latter has more ingredients. Vaseline is 100 percent petrolatum, while Aquaphor also contains mineral oil, panthenol, and other ingredients.

Both Vaseline and Aquaphor work toward the same goal: sealing moisture into the skin. Many dermatologists recommend Aquaphor over Vaseline, but the best thing to do is to test what works best for your skin. With that in mind, Aquaphor is both a humectant (promotes the retention of moisture in the skin) and occlusive (meaning it creates a physical barrier on top of the skin), while Vaseline leans mostly occlusive. Falling into both of these categories only means that there’s more power behind keeping the skin moisturized.

As with anything, there are pros and cons to skin slugging. Some products are heavier than others and can cause pores to clog (leading to breakouts, more on that below). Skin slugging is a relatively safe method, but if you’re worried about potential downsides, you should do a patch test and check in with your dermatologist beforehand. As always, make sure and confirm that you aren’t allergic to any of the ingredients before adding them to your skin.

Simply put: No, slugging is not for everyone. Dr. Marchbein says slugging very oily or acne-prone skin on your face is a hard no because it can cause more irritation. “If you're trapping things and occluding the skin, there is definitely a potential for breakouts," Dr. Marchbein tells Teen Vogue.

However, the practice can help even those with oilier skin with a targeted approach. “Selectively slugging,” as Dr. Marchbein puts it, means treating only the dehydrated or eczema-prone spots on your face or body. “If you're acne-prone but want a similar effect, I would use a creamy moisturizer instead of petrolatum. Look for ingredients like ceramides, hyaluronic acid, glycerin, and dimethicone. And then you can spot treat with Vaseline where you're drier."

If you want to try out slugging, the process breakdown goes like this:

1. Cleanse and dampen your face as you normally would

2. (OPTIONAL) Apply hydration, like a gentle serum and/or moisturizer. Dr. Marchbein says you can use products with hyaluronic acid or any hydrating moisturizer underneath your slugging layer, but she doesn't think it's mandatory. If you do go for it, she recommends keeping it gentle.

3. Seal it in with a thin, occlusive layer of Vaseline or any petrolatum-based ointment. Dr. Marchbein's biggest warning? Remember to keep the petrolatum layer thin.

It really depends on your skin type. Oilier skin will need less slugging, while dry or combination skin types can handle slugging more often. Keep in mind that you may not see noticeable results until after you've been skin slugging for four to six weeks. Also beware of the weather, you skin might benefit from slugging more in the colder months than in the summer.

For the purpose of this review, I slugged in targeted dry spots on my face (i.e. my forehead, jawline, lips, and parts of my cheeks) and body for a little over a month. Since I do have combination, acne-prone skin, I avoided slugging all over my face and neck, though that is something you might consider if yours is on the dryer side or if you have mature skin. All in all, I can affirm that slugging saved my very dry skin during the harsh winter months.

I had reservations about putting petrolatum all over my face, to begin with, so approaching slugging with a more targeted approach felt like a good way to dip my toes. I slugged at night before bed, and the results you get in a month aren't something the camera would pick up necessarily, but you can definitely feel it when you wake up the next day. My skin was automatically holding onto moisture better, and I started realizing what dehydrated skin actually felt like. What I had always thought was tight or puffy “morning skin” was actually just dehydration, which, thankfully, as we now know, is completely avoidable.

One of the fastest places I saw a difference was my lips. If you have dry lips, try slugging them. Wet and moisturize your lips, and then seal them in with Vaseline. The skin on your lips is so much thinner, so you'll see a difference that day. As we head into warmer months, I'll still be slugging at night with a more targeted approach, readjusting accordingly as I pay more attention to my oil production and dehydrated areas.

Now that you've decided to try slugging, it's time to decide what product you should go for. Dr. Marchbein recommends CeraVe's Healing Ointment and La Roche-Posay Lipikar Daily Lotion, but Vaseline Pure Petrolatum works just fine and so does Aquaphor. However, Dr. Marchbein warns us this last one, as well as the classic Bag Balm, do contain an ingredient called lanolin, so she warns against that option for those with lanolin sensitivities.

Here are some expert-suggest slugging products to start working with:

If you do go for the extra layer of hydration, the moisturizer you use beforehand is as important as the petrolatum you use to seal it. Check out some hydration recommendations below: