Most acne sufferers will have oily skin and therefore, as a general rule of thumb, it is best to avoid oily cosmetic or medication acne products. Luckily, nowadays, most of these products will have the term "non comedogenic" imprinted on its label which simply means they are oil free.
An oil-free product or which is more popular known as non comedogenic product avoids most ingredients that contain the word oil in their name, such as mineral oil. However,there are a lot of ingredients that do not have the word oil in their names such as glyceryl tribehenate or lanolin which are actually oil.
Ingredients such as carnauba and oily hydrocarbons such as petrolatum and squalene are not oils but should not be included in an oil-free product as these oils may aggravate your acne condition.
Essential oils used in fragrance does not pose a problem to acne as their oil behaviour is different from other oils.
There are two classes of oil-free products. One contains strictly oil-free products which are usually drying. Of course, there are some exceptions. Propylene glycol, glycerin and silicone bases are oil-free and yet they are not drying. For acne sufferers who are resistant to acne treatment, it is important to identify strictly oil-free products to complement their topical medications. These products include gels, solutions and emulsions of oil-free ingredients. Ingredients such as fatty acids, fatty alcohols, sterols and silicones are acceptable in strictly oil-free products.
The other classes consist of certain amount of oil that contains oil-like emmollients called esters. Technically, esters are not considered oils or fats but they do exhibit the behaviour of oil. Products containing emmollient esters are classified as comedogenic. Oil-free emulsions of emollient esters and water are weakly moisturizing and are best used by acne sufferers with slightly oily to slightly drying skin.
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