Experts in Vitamin A

Vitamin A (also known as retinol / retinal) is the unequivocal gold standard in skincare when it comes to anti-ageing concerns. However, this active is notoriously unstable and renowned for causing irritation - but not at Medik8! Our cutting-edge vitamin A range is formulated to suit all skin types and needs, boasting expertly stabilised strengths that ensure maximum youth-boosting results alongside minimal irritation.

Key Benefits of Vitamin A

Vitamin A, The Medik8 Way

There are many different types of vitamin A (retinoids), but not all are equal in power or effectiveness. As Experts in Vitamin A, we only use those forms of vitamin A with proven scientific evidence to ensure our formulas deliver visible age-defying results - for both the face and delicate eye area.

Stability Matters

If vitamin A isn’t stabilised, it simply isn’t going to be as effective over time. At Medik8, we understand that it’s essential to not only stabilise retinoids, but also to ensure that the product packaging is adequate in keeping the formula fresher for longer. That’s why all of our formulas feature industry-leading stabilisation systems as well as innovative packaging to ensure maximum visible results alongside minimal irritation - until the very last drop.

Progressive Strengths

Many of our vitamin A formulas are available in a choice of increasing strengths. Work your way up when you’re ready and continue to see the results you love.

Proven Results

At Medik8, we only use proven forms of vitamin A, and rigorously test our formulas in both consumer and clinical trials - so you get the very best results and experience.

An Option For Everyone

Our wide range of vitamin As are formulated with every skin type and need in mind. From vitamin A newbies to experienced retinoid lovers, we have something to suit everyone.

HEAR FROM THE EXPERTS

Daniel Isaacs

MEDIK8’S DIRECTOR OF RESEARCH

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It’s no secret that vitamin A has its challenges. When delivered at levels high enough to have a visible effect on skin ageing, it can often cause irritation. That’s why we’ve developed industry-leading stabilisation technologies and expertly optimised formulations to minimise the potential for irritation while maximising visible results.

Find Your Vitamin A

At Medik8, we work with 3 proven forms of vitamin A; retinol, retinaldehyde (retinal) and retinyl retinoate.
"What’s the difference?’’ we hear you ask. Let us explain.

RETINOL

The Classic Vitamin A

We take traditional retinol’s anti-ageing benefits to the next level within our Intelligent Retinol range by enriching our formulas with climbazole, a proven retinol-boosting ingredient.

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RETINAL

The ‘Everyone’ Vitamin A

The star of our breakthrough Crystal Retinal range, retinaldehyde works 11 times faster than classic retinol^[1] to deliver remarkable results - without the prescription or the irritation. New to Crystal Retinal? Start at Crystal Retinal 3. Regular vitamin A user? Try Crystal Retinal 6.

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RETINYL RETINOATE

Our Ultimate Vitamin A

Medik8’s exclusive supermolecule - 8 years in the making and 8 times more powerful than retinol.^[2] Non-irritating on the most sensitive skin and uniquely photostable, it can be used both day and night for profound age-defying results that outperform retinol in every way.

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Add Vitamin A to Your Evening Regime

Still unsure? Check out our detailed Layering Guides.

Vitamin A: Deep Dive

Keen to learn even more about vitamin A?

Delve into the science behind this age-defying hero with Medik8’s very own Director of Research, Daniel Isaacs.

More From Our Experts

Explore the Key Differences Between Retinol and Retinal
Meet Medik8’s Clinical Strength Retinal for Under Eyes
Learn How to Safely Move to a Higher Vitamin A Strength

Discover CSA

Enhance and maintain the age-defying benefits of vitamin A by adding vitamin C and sunscreen to your daily skincare routine. This powerhouse trio is the holy grail to achieving more youthful-looking skin and makes up Medik8’s pioneering CSA Philosophy^Ⓡ: vitamin C plus sunscreen by day, vitamin A by night. Follow this simple, clinically proven approach and discover Beautiful Skin for Life.

I’ve been using vitamin A before from another brand, what should I move onto in Medik8?

As a general rule we say start on 1 strength lower than you were using from another brand. Unfortunately we do not know how stable the other brand’s retinol serum was; what was labelled as 1% retinol may actually be equivalent to a much lower concentration of retinol if it has degraded. Therefore, to stay on the safe side, we would recommend going lower in strength with our stabilised vitamin A serums to ease your skin into using them, and avoid irritation.

If retinol:

What percentage of retinol were you using in the other brand?

Don’t know - start on Retinol 3TR

0-0.6% - start on Intelligent Retinol 3TR

0.7-1% - start on Intelligent Retinol 6TR or start on Crystal Retinal 3

If retinyl retinoate - start on r-Retinoate Day & Night or r-Retinoate Intense

I am using a Medik8 Intelligent Retinol serum - how do I switch to Crystal Retinal?

In general we recommend that new users of Crystal Retinal start with Crystal Retinal 3. This is an effective, but relatively lower strength of retinaldehyde, to give your skin an opportunity to adjust to the new vitamin A molecule.

There are a couple of exceptions depending on which retinol product you are currently using. Here is our guide:

If you have very sensitive skin -> Crystal Retinal 1

Night Ritual Vitamin A -> Crystal Retinal 3

Intelligent Retinol 3TR -> Crystal Retinal 3

Intelligent Retinol 6TR -> Crystal Retinal 3

Intelligent Retinol 10TR -> Crystal Retinal 6

I’ve never used vitamin A before - where do I start?

At Medik8, we use three forms of Vitamin A: retinol, retinaldehyde, retinyl retinoate. You can start with any one of these molecules. We’d always recommend incorporating your vitamin A into our wider CSA regime - so pick a vitamin C and sunscreen for day also to really amplify results. Take a look at our CSA Kit Builder to find your perfect regime.

When do I have to phase vitamin A into my routine?

Every time you start on a new molecule of vitamin A (eg. switching between Intelligent Retinol and Crystal Retinal). Except when switching to r-Retinoate Day & Night, which is so gentle it doesn’t need to be phased in. You do not have to phase in when moving up strength in the same vitamin A ladder (eg. moving from Crystal Retinal 3 to Crystal Retinal 6).

Examples:

If moving from Intelligent Retinol to Crystal Retinal - phase in

If moving from Crystal Retinal 3 to Crystal Retinal 6 - don’t need to phase in

If moving from Intelligent Retinol/Crystal Retinal to r-Retinoate Day & Night - don’t need to phase in

If moving from Intelligent Retinol to r-Retinoate Intense - phase in (due to retinal content)

If moving from Crystal Retinal to r-Retinoate Intense - don’t need to phase in (same molecule: retinal)

Why can I start on r-Retinoate Intense but not Crystal Retinal 6?

r-Retinoate Intense is a nourishing cream formulation, which contains lots of emollients, squalane and ceramides, which minimise its potential for irritation on the skin, in comparison to Crystal Retinal 6 which is a lighter cream-serum. It also contains 3 types of Time Release Technology; polymer-encapsulated retinyl retinoate, crystal-encapsulated retinaldehyde, and polymer reservoir technology. All three modes of Time Release minimise the irritation potential for r-Retinoate Intense, and we are confident that most skin types will be able to phase this into their skincare routine without issue.

DISCOVER VITAMIN A

Category	Purpose/Activity	Type of data	Lawful basis for processing including basis of legitimate interest
Customer	To register you as a new customer, to process and deliver your order (including managing payments and collecting money owed to us)	(a) Identity and Contact (b) Transaction (c) Profile	(a) Performance of a contract with you (b) Necessary for our legitimate interests (in recovering our debts, to keep our records updated)
Customer	To manage our relationship with you which will include: (a) Notifying you about changes to our terms or Privacy Policy (b) Asking you to leave a review or take a survey (c) Providing you with information about our Articles and to make suggestions and recommendations to you about goods which may interest you (d) To enable you to partake in a prize draw, competition or complete a survey	(a) Identity and Contact (b) Profile (c) Marketing and Communications (d) Technical and Usage Data	(a) Performance of a contract with you (b) Necessary to comply with a legal obligation (c) Necessary for our legitimate interests (to keep our records updated and to study how customers use our Articles, to develop them and to conduct direct marketing)
Customer	To investigate customer complaints (which may involve us processing your health data), including any complaints you make to one of our distributors and to enable us to make improvements to our Articles	(a) Identity and Contact (b) Special category data (c) Transaction	(a) Performance of a contract with you (b) Necessary to comply with a legal obligation (c) Necessary for our legitimate interests in improving our Articles (d) Where we use special category data, based on your explicit consent
Customer	To establish, exercise or defend legal claims made against us, to provide our insurance company with relevant details of any claim or potential claim and to contact third party experts to understand the scientific basis behind any claim or potential claim	(a) Identity and Contact (b) Special category data (c) Transaction	(a) Necessary for the establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims
Representative	To carry out our contractual obligations to your Employer, including to: (a) Provide you with the Articles you order (b) If your Employer is one of our Distributors and you work in sales, to provide training to you, and invite you to our conferences (c) Provide you with access to the Medik8 Cloud (d) Administer the contracts we have entered into with our Distributors, Business Customers, Official Medik8 Stockists, Registered Medik8 Clinics, Registered Medik8 Trainers and Registered Medik8 Therapists (e) Manage payments, fees and charges, and collect monies owed to us (f) Enable us to make suggestions of Articles which may be of interest to you (g) To manage our relationship with you and your Employer	(a) Identity and Contact (b) Representative Data (c) Transaction (d) Technical and Usage (e) Marketing and Communications	Necessary for our legitimate interests in: fulfilling our contractual obligations to your Employer for record keeping purposes and business efficiency enabling us to conduct direct marketing ensuring all individuals involved in the selling of our Articles are adequately qualified enabling us to maintain sufficient records regarding complaints made to ensure our treatments are delivered to a high standard and our brand reputation maintained enabling you to properly perform your job functions; and successfully running our conferences and events.
Trainer	To provide you with training to enable you to perform your job, to publish your profile details on our sites, to invite you to attend any training events or conferences we organise and to maintain records and investigate any complaints made about you	(a) Identity and Contact (b) Trainer (c) Marketing and Communications	Necessary for our legitimate interests (i) to help ensure all individuals involved in the selling of our Articles are adequately qualified, (ii) to enable you to properly perform your job functions, (iii) to successfully run our conferences and events, (iv) to provide interested persons with information relating to your training, qualifications and ratings and (v) to enable us to maintain sufficient records regarding complaints made to help ensure our treatments are delivered to a high standard and our brand reputation maintained
Therapist	To provide you with training to enable you to perform your job, to publish your profile details on our sites, to invite you to attend any training events or conferences we organise, to maintain records and investigate any complaints made about you	(a) Identity and Contact (b) Therapist (c) Marketing and Communications	Necessary for our legitimate interests (i) to help ensure individuals involved in providing treatments to Customers are adequately qualified (ii) to provide Customers with information relating to your training, qualifications and ratings, (ii) to enable you to properly perform your job functions, and (iii) to enable us to maintain sufficient records regarding complaints made to help ensure our treatments are delivered to a high standard and our brand reputation maintained
Candidate	To consider you for a role, if you are applying for a job with us, including: (a) Assessing your skills, qualifications and suitability for the role; (b) To carry out background and reference checks, where applicable and lawful to do so (c) To communicate with you about the recruitment process (d) To determine whether to enter into a contract of employment with you (e) To keep records related to our hiring processes (f) To comply with our legal or regulatory requirements	(a) Identity and Contact (b) Candidate (c) Technical and Usage (d) Special Category Data	(a) Necessary to take steps at your request prior to entering into a contract with you, or to enter into a contract with you (b) Necessary for our legitimate interests (to recruit suitable employees and to manage our recruitment process) (c) To comply with our legal obligations, such as to make reasonable adjustments and to carry out equal opportunities monitoring
Distributor Shareholders	To manage our relationship with our Distributors and for accounts and record keeping purposes	(a) Distributor	Necessary for our legitimate interests in managing our distribution contracts and for record keeping purposes
Supplier Personnel	To carry out our contractual obligations to our suppliers, including to manage our payments to such suppliers	(a) Identity and Contact (b) Transaction	Necessary for our legitimate interests in receiving products and services from our suppliers to ensure our business is run efficiently
All site users and visitors	To administer and protect our business and this sites (including troubleshooting, data analysis, testing, system maintenance, support, reporting and hosting of data)	(a) Identity (b) Contact (c) Technical	(a) Necessary for our legitimate interests (for running our business, provision of administration and IT services, network security, to prevent fraud and in the context of a business reorganisation or group restructuring exercise) (b) Necessary to comply with a legal obligation
All site users and visitors	To deliver relevant site content and advertisements to you and measure or understand the effectiveness of the advertising we serve to you	(a) Identity (b) Contact (c) Profile (d) Usage (e) Marketing and Communications (f) Technical	Necessary for our legitimate interests (to study how customers use our Articles, to develop them, to grow our business and to inform our marketing strategy)
All site users and visitors	To use data analytics to improve our site, Articles, marketing, customer relationships and experiences	(a) Technical (b) Usage	Necessary for our legitimate interests (to define types of customers for our Articles, to keep our site updated and relevant, to develop our business and to inform our marketing strategy)