If you want healthy and flawless skin, there are two very important acids you must know the best for your skin type : AHAs (alpha-hydroxy acids) and BHAs (beta-hydroxy acids)

AHA (Alpha Hydroxy acid):

Even though AHA and BHA are often combined in order to give you a flawless skin, but AHA alone can also work efficiently for exfoliating your skin. AHA is basically formed of two different types of acids, namely, Glycolic Acid and Lactic Acid. AHA usually works for the outer surface of your skin and doesn’t usually penetrate inside the skin. This means it is good for removing blemishes and marks of your skin rather than providing deep cleansing.

Moreover, if you are thinking that AHA might help you with the clogged pores, whiteheads, blackheads, bacterial infections inside the skin or cystic acne – then you are wrong. AHA doesn’t provide a deep cleansing effect and therefore tends to work on the outer surface of your skin.

But there are obviously tons of advantages of AHA which you might want to know, right? Well, AHA helps in resurfacing the skin by removing all the dead skin cells and making your skin glowing radiant. Moreover, it also gives you an even toned complexion and acts as a moisturizing agent which means it can be used for normal to dry skin types.

Other than this, AHA also helps in removing sun damage spots, pigmentation, removing acne spots or any spot on the skin which needs to fade away. Last but not the least, it also increases the production of collagen which is amazing for anti-aging. Amazing, right?

BHA (Beta Hydroxy acid):

Now that we are done with one exfoliating agent AHA let’s move on to the second one – BHA. BHA, which you already know stands for Beta Hydroxy Acid is great for cleansing the skin deep down.

Unlike, AHA, BHA penetrates and absorbs deep inside your skin which helps in removing the acne growth from inside your skin. BHA is mainly meant to target acne-prone skin. It actually fights against the bacterial infections and acts as an anti-inflammatory as well. Since it helps in clearing up the skin from the roots, therefore, it is often the first priority for most of the people. So, if you have clogged pores, whiteheads, and blackheads then using any product with a higher percentage of BHA is always good for you.

But, BHA doesn’t work for everyone, especially people with sensitive skin. So, before you try out any product which has BHA make sure that the percentage of BHA is somewhat lower. If it seems to work for you, you can increase the percentage of BHA to get better results. (The ideal percentage of BHA is normally 2%-3% though).