I was eyeballing Skinbetter AlphaRet, but reviews are mixed on whether this is actually very gentle or not.

I’ve been using the brand consistently for years, throughout many ups and downs in my skin journey. Often pairing it with more intensive office treatments too. With that being said, this time around before repurchasing I’m finally realizing that I don’t think I’ve ever realllly been happy with the products and likely have convinced myself they’re effective because of the price. I just can’t stomach spending another $1K for mediocrity. I’ll note that I don’t have any adverse reactions or issues, just don’t know that I ever feel like they really work or that I see an improvement in my skin.

I recently went to an esthetician for the first time to start working on my melasma. She wrote me a regime of Skinbetter products (Even Intensive, Alpharet, and Alto advanced). I plan on purchasing the even intensive since that will help my melasma but the other products aren’t as necessary other than aging prevention. I’m not sure I want to spend the money on the skinbetter retinol and vitamin-c products so I’m wondering if anyone has comps for products and a slightly lower price point? Like $100 and under?

8- SkinBetter Science AlphaRet Overnight Serum

I have been using skinbetter since September and my skin is incredible! I dont have too much to say about eye max, other than I just ordered some for myself the other day. I say go for it! I absolutely love all of my other skinbetter products, and their alpharet is so gentle yet effective.

Skin Better Science alpha ret overnight cream. I don’t think I’ll ever find a dupe for this retinol. Pea sized amount goes a long way and the hydrating aspects works great on my sensitive skin. One of the items I’m glad my med spa recommended!

I love Alpharet! I found it to be very gentle. I was able to jump right in to using it every night, which was amazing because I struggle with remembering to do stronger retinols every 3 days or so.

I asked an esthetician for a retinol recommendation and she suggested Skinbetter Sciences Alpha Ret. I’ve been using it since Jan 27. On Feb 4 I had acne. This must be the dreaded purge. I’m only using one day a week. Should I increase usage or stop it?

I started using SkinBetter AlphaRet about a year ish ago and saw absolutely no difference so about 6 months ago I switched to ZO wrinkle and texture which is 0.5% retinol.

AlphaRet’s primary claim is that it kind of combines retinoic acid with lactic acid, both of which are really powerful ingredients. Beyond that, it’s got niacinimide, and a host of other anti aging ingredients. But none of these are $200 ingredients. They can all be found at a drug store in a number of products, and at well researched percentages. What sets AlphaRet apart is that it’s adding retinoic acid into the mix, potentially giving you retinol in a more gentle way than tret/otc retinols. But there is a HUGE issue with that claim: They formulated with a retinol ester they suppose will get into the skin and market as the star ingredient, but they don’t have any studies showing that the retinol ester actually works. There are a number of different markers that show retinoic activity in the skin and ways you can test a product to make sure the retinol is converting the way you would expect… but SkinBetter hasn’t published a single one that I’ve found. Instead, they have a small study over 12 weeks comparing AlphaRet to 1% retinol and 0.025% tretinoin, but they did a really bad job setting up the experiment. They formulated with a *ton* of products that are known to smooth the skin’s texture (niacinimide, several acids, etc. You can glance at the ingredients and see that even without retinol it should help with aging and texture.) but they did not include AlphaRet without their Retinol Ester as a control to see how the product performs without the “star ingredient.” That is absolutely essential when you test a formulation that has so many actives that support such similar goals. Then they had participants do half of their face with AlphaRet and half with the other product (which is a problem if it’s own because of how products migrate) and compared results, but they didn’t actually do the testing to see if the skin treated with AlohaRet even shows signs of retinoic activity. They have published exactly zero of the common markers. So then the question becomes… well, what are you paying for? You may be getting Retin A but you may not. It might be more gentle because of the formulation or it might be more gentle because there isn’t actually retinoid activity. So are you experiencing great results because of their proprietary formulation, or because of common acids, niacinimide, etc. (all of which are great, but very affordable, ingredients.) Hard to say. 🤷🏼‍♀️ So can you get an exact dupe? No. There is not a dupe. But can you get all of the things separately? Yeah, and possibly more effectively. If you tolerate Tret, I’d get that. If not, differin will give you retinol impact in a far more gentle vehicle (and despite the claim that more research is done on medical grade skincare, it actually has a lot more research). Then the other ingredients aren’t that hard to find. Niacinimide is in everything. Acids will help with texture but can be purchased OTC. Instead of looking for a product dupe, I’d look more closely at the ingredients. I suspect you could get similar results quite easily, though perhaps not in one step. :)