What goes on first?
Add the products you already own and we'll line them up in the exact order they should hit your face — morning and evening, with wait times where they matter, how many nights a week each active deserves, and an automatic alternate-night schedule when your retinoid and your acids both want the evening slot.
Your order of operations
Thin to thick, actives placedAdd one or more products above and the ordered routine appears instantly. Nothing is uploaded — it all runs in your browser.
Your routine lineup — saved on this device, and to your free account when you're signed in. See or clear it in My Library.
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How the order is built
Every product in the DermApproved database carries its routine step — cleanser, toner, treatment, serum, moisturizer, occlusive, sunscreen — plus its texture form and a normalized map of its active ingredients. The tool sorts your selection thin-to-thick within each step, forces retinoids into the evening and pure vitamin C into the morning, pins sunscreen as the final morning layer, and inserts wait-time hints only where the science says a pause actually earns you something.
It also handles the scheduling problem most order guides ignore: if a retinoid and an exfoliating acid both land in your evening, the PM column splits into alternating nights — retinoid nights and acid nights — with your cleanser, moisturizer, and other non-actives repeated in both, so the whole week is planned, not just a single evening. Frequency chips on each product tell you whether it's a daily player or a two-to-three-nights-a-week specialist.
Common questions
What is the thin-to-thick rule, and does it have exceptions?
Layer products from the lightest texture to the heaviest — watery toners and essences first, then serums, then lotions and creams, then balms or oils — so each layer can actually reach your skin instead of sitting on top of an occlusive film. The big exceptions are sunscreen, which always goes last in the morning regardless of texture, and prescription treatments, which most dermatologists advise applying to clean, dry skin before anything else.
How long should I wait between skincare layers?
For most products, you don't need to wait at all — a few seconds for the previous layer to stop feeling wet is plenty. The exceptions worth honoring: give pure vitamin C about a minute to absorb, let acid treatments sit 10–15 minutes if your skin is reactive, and let everything settle before sunscreen so the SPF forms an even, unbroken film.
Which actives belong in the morning and which at night?
Pure vitamin C earns its keep in the morning, where it boosts your sunscreen's UV defense; retinoids belong at night because some forms degrade in sunlight and skin repairs itself while you sleep. Exfoliating acids can go either way, but evening use is the common default since they leave skin temporarily more sun-sensitive.
Can I use a retinoid and exfoliating acids in the same week?
Yes — just not in the same evening. The standard dermatologist-endorsed pattern is alternating nights: retinoid on night A, acids on night B, with your cleanser and moisturizer staying constant across both. This tool builds that split automatically whenever it spots both in your evening lineup.
Does application order actually matter that much?
For actives, genuinely yes — sunscreen under moisturizer loses its film, and a pure vitamin C serum buried beneath a heavy cream absorbs poorly. For the middle layers, less than the internet suggests: swapping two similar serums changes very little, so don't agonize over hydrating layers as long as the anchors (cleanse first, SPF last) hold.