Natural Acne Treatment

There are plenty of harsh, astringent treatments for acne, but more and more people are finding that a gentle, natural approach that nourishes the skin works better in the long run.

Acne is more than the odd spot. It causes genuine pain and irritation, and for many people real anxiety and self-consciousness, especially as a teenager. It most commonly affects the face, but can also show up on the back and chest. For most people it settles with age, but it can be severe.

There’s a lot more to acne than the products you put on your skin, so this page looks at what causes it, what can make it worse, and the natural acne solutions worth knowing about, from zinc and aloe vera to diet and gut health. If you’d like to go straight to our recommended products and exactly how to use them, see our natural skincare for acne-prone skin.

What Causes Acne

Acne develops when hair follicles become clogged with excess oil (sebum) and dead skin cells. Cutibacterium acnes (formerly Propionibacterium acnes), a bacterium that lives on everyone’s skin, particularly in oily areas, can then thrive in that clogged, low-oxygen environment, contributing to inflammation and spots.

Several things can make this more likely:

  • Hormonal changes, in teenagers, around periods, in pregnancy and perimenopause, and with conditions like PCOS
  • A diet high in sugar and refined carbohydrates, and for some people dairy, particularly skimmed milk
  • Stress
  • Poor sleep
  • Certain medications, including corticosteroids (topical, oral or inhaled), some hormonal contraception, anabolic steroids and lithium
  • Friction and pressure from phones, sports equipment, masks or backpacks
  • Gut health
  • Smoking
  • Genetics

Is It Definitely Acne?

Several other conditions look like acne, and some respond very differently, so it’s worth ruling them out first:

  • Steroid-induced acne. If your breakouts appeared or worsened while using a steroid cream or inhaler, this is a recognised reaction, and in some cases is connected to the same rebound mechanism behind topical steroid withdrawal. See our Topical Steroid Withdrawal page if this sounds like your situation.
  • Perioral dermatitis. Small bumps clustered around the mouth, nose or eyes, often with a clear margin next to the lip, are more likely to be perioral or periorificial dermatitis than acne. See our Perioral and Periorificial Dermatitis page.
  • Rosacea. Rosacea is sometimes still called “acne rosacea”, and many people search for natural remedies for acne and rosacea together, but it’s a different condition, typically with flushing and persistent redness across the cheeks and nose and no blackheads. See our Natural Rosacea Treatment page.
  • Fungal acne. Lots of small, uniform, itchy bumps, often on the chest, back or forehead, and often worse in heat and humidity, may be Malassezia (pityrosporum) folliculitis, which is caused by a yeast rather than bacteria. Rich, oil-based skincare, including ours, can feed this yeast, so if this sounds like you, please see your GP before trying our products.
  • A damaged skin barrier. Breakouts that appear alongside dryness, tightness, redness or stinging, especially after a lot of new products, scrubs, peels or actives, are often a sign of a stripped barrier rather than acne needing something stronger. See How to Repair a Damaged Skin Barrier Naturally.

Why Your Skin Barrier and Microbiome Matter

This is really the heart of a natural approach to acne. Your skin barrier, the tightly organised structure held together by lipids like ceramides, cholesterol and fatty acids, seals moisture in and keeps irritants out. Alongside it sits your skin’s microbiome, the community of bacteria living on its surface, which helps keep acne-associated bacteria in check when it’s in balance (see How Your Skin Works). Two things disrupt both more than almost anything else:

  • Antimicrobial preservatives, found in most conventional skincare, kill bacteria indiscriminately, good and bad alike. Our products are water-free, so they don’t need them at all, which is better for your microbiome, not just gentler on sensitive skin.
  • Stripping cleansers and over-scrubbing, which remove sebum and barrier lipids entirely rather than working with them, often cause skin to overcompensate by producing even more oil, the opposite of what you want, while also leaving the barrier itself compromised.

Keeping both your microbiome and your barrier intact, and avoiding that stripping rebound cycle, is the foundation of everything else on this page.

Avoid Pore-Clogging Ingredients

Several common ingredients are worth checking labels for. Coconut oil and isopropyl myristate are well known for clogging pores, and SLS (sodium lauryl sulfate) is a common irritant. Preservatives are a separate concern: they’re not typically pore-clogging, but they can disrupt your skin’s microbiome in the way described above, which matters just as much here. See our Skin Irritants page for the fuller picture. If your breakouts cluster around your mouth, toothpaste ingredients are worth considering too (and see the note on perioral dermatitis above).

Natural Remedies for Acne

Zinc

Zinc is one of the best-researched natural acne remedies, both taken orally and applied to the skin. In one small trial, 48 people with mild to moderate acne took an oral zinc and antioxidant complex for 12 weeks, and nearly 79% saw an 80-100% improvement. We offer zinc two ways: Zinc and Calendula Cream, applied to the skin (see our skincare for acne-prone skin for how to use it), and our Bio Zinc supplement, as zinc contributes to the maintenance of normal skin.

Sulphur

Sulphur has been used for acne for well over a century and is still used by dermatologists today. It helps loosen the dead skin cells that clog pores, and has antibacterial and antifungal properties, so it may also help with fungal acne. The catch is that it’s very drying, and sulphur soaps add the alkaline, stripping effect of soap on top, so it’s one to use sparingly, once or twice a week at most, never daily. Avoid broken skin, don’t combine it with other actives like retinol or acids, and stop if your skin becomes tight, flaky or sore. We sell a traditional Sulphur Soap, and you’ll find how to fit it into a routine in our natural skincare for acne-prone skin.

Calendula

Calendula is a traditional herbal remedy for irritated skin, valued for its soothing properties. We grow our own here in Wells, Somerset, and it’s in many of our products, including our Zinc and Calendula Cream.

Aloe Vera

Aloe vera has a genuinely soothing effect on skin, with documented antibacterial and calming properties. Shop-bought aloe gel needs a preservative to stay stable once opened, so if you’d rather avoid that, growing your own plant and using fresh gel straight from a cut leaf is simple and effective. Just use it promptly, since fresh, unpreserved gel won’t keep for long.

Colloidal Silver

Colloidal silver is made of tiny silver particles suspended in liquid, and silver does have antimicrobial properties. Some people use it on stubborn breakouts believing it selectively targets acne-causing bacteria while sparing the microbiome, but the evidence doesn’t really support that. Silver is broad-spectrum rather than selective, and one study found C. acnes to be more resistant to silver than other skin bacteria, meaning it may do more to disrupt helpful bacteria than to tackle the one actually involved in acne.

Because a healthy microbiome keeps acne-causing bacteria in check by itself, we’d treat silver as a last resort, used occasionally and for short periods, never as a daily product. See Ingredients We Avoid for our concerns about daily use. If you do try it, patch test first, choose a reputable brand (products aren’t standardised), and don’t use it on broken skin. Never take colloidal silver by mouth: it can build up in the body, permanently turn skin bluish-grey, and interact with medicines.

Diet and Gut Health

Diet and gut health both play a genuine role in acne for many people, though the exact relationship is still being researched. The strongest evidence is for a lower-glycaemic diet, less sugar and refined carbohydrate and more fibre, with dairy (especially skimmed milk) a trigger for some people. See our Foods for Healthy Skin page. Gut health is worth attention too, see our Gut-Skin Axis page, and consider probiotic foods or a supplement like our Multibiotic.

Histamine and Acne

Histamine’s role in acne is far less established than it is in eczema or rosacea, but it may be worth considering if your breakouts don’t behave like typical spots. Mast cells near the oil glands can release histamine when triggered, by stress hormones, heat, fragrance, or possibly certain foods. Signs that might point that way:

  • It itches, rather than just feeling sore or tender.
  • It looks unusually red, swollen or “angry”, more than your typical breakouts.
  • It appears fast, within hours of a trigger, rather than building slowly over days the way hormonal spots often do.
  • A personal history of hay fever, allergies, or reacting easily to insect bites, which suggests generally reactive mast cells.

None of these prove it alone (and itchy bumps can also be fungal acne, see above), but if a few line up consistently, it’s worth investigating. Our Histamine Sensitivity and Intolerance page covers what triggers mast cells, what raises your overall histamine load, and practical ways to reduce it.

Our Approach in Brief

Cleanse with an oil-based balm rather than a stripping wash, keep your routine simple and consistent, use zinc on individual spots, add sulphur soap once or twice a week if you’d like, and protect your barrier and microbiome by avoiding preservatives, harsh scrubs and layered actives. You’ll find the full approach, step by step, with the products to use, in our natural skincare for acne-prone skin. Always patch test first, see Patch Testing and Potential Reactions.

When to See Your GP or Dermatologist

If your acne is severe, painful, scarring, or not responding to a gentler approach, please see your GP or a dermatologist. Effective prescription treatments exist, though they carry their own side effects, and doctors are increasingly cautious about antibiotics given rising antimicrobial resistance.