Can the Sun Help Acne?
Is sunlight good for you?
It’s likely that you typically soak up the sun for vitamin D, which we all need to support our bone growth and immune systems (Wolpowitz). The sun's UV rays hitting your skin initiates the production of vitamin D in your body, and it only takes a little bit of sunlight to trigger this process, so most people get at least part of their daily dose of vitamin D from the sun (NIH Office of Dietary Supplements).
Because sunlight helps you to produce vitamin D, in that respect, some people consider sunlight to be “good for you”. However, others think that sunlight’s benefits extend beyond triggering vitamin D production and that the sunlight itself is actually good for your skin, namely, for getting rid of acne. So, does the sun help acne?
Does the sun get rid of acne?
Stating that “the sun helps acne” is a broad statement that needs to be broken down. It’s been hypothesized that vitamin D, a product of sunlight, helps to treat acne. This is independent from the hypothesis that sunlight itself is beneficial to acne-prone skin.
Let’s first look at whether vitamin D helps to treat acne.
Does vitamin D get rid of acne?
A small study from 2016 found a potential link between vitamin D deficiency and acne. Vitamin D deficiency was detected in 48.8% of patients with acne but only in 22.5% of patients without acne. More severe deficiency was detected in patients with more severe acne (Lim). So, patients with more acne tended to have less vitamin D found in their bodies.
But correlation does not prove causation: this does not tell us whether low vitamin D levels cause acne, if acne causes low vitamin D levels, or if there is a third factor at play causing the conditions that hasn’t been discovered.
Unfortunately, the potential link between vitamin D deficiency and acne has not been extensively studied. And furthermore, vitamin D is just a consequence of sun exposure, which does not address whether sun exposure on your skin is actually helpful, independent of vitamin D. Some people have cited the sun as a cure for acne; in the past, this was a traditional view and reasoning as to why acne may improve in the summer and worsen in the winter (Magin).
Does sunlight itself get rid of acne?
The reverse may potentially be true: sunlight may actually make your acne breakouts worse. A recent study showed that the higher temperatures caused by the summer sun can aggravate acne because of sweating and increased humidity (Sardana).
The ultraviolet (UV) light that constitutes sunlight is very harmful for your skin in general. In addition to causing uncomfortable sunburns, UV light actually damages your skin at a DNA level, causing inflammation, blotchiness, collagen degradation, wrinkles (Shanbhag). Sun damage is very harmful because it both makes you more vulnerable to diseases like skin cancer. It also causes your skin to age more visibly. 80% of skin diseases and signs of aging like wrinkles and fine lines come from sun exposure (Shanbhag). Direct sunlight is not a solution for acne and actively harms your skin.
Does the sun help acne scars?
If not an active breakout, can the sun help treat acne scars from a past breakout? Acne scars are a form of hyperpigmentation. Tanning in the sun may make the acne scars seem less visible by darkening the complexion of the whole face to match the color of the acne scars, but this isn’t worth the risk.
Tanning is essentially sun damage: exposure to ultraviolet light causes the skin to darken, indicating injury to the skin. Additionally, ultraviolet light will also cause aging and skin cancer (Zaidi). Tanning can reduce the appearance of acne scars, but it does not treat them and damages the skin.
