In this article, we’ll show you some of the best melatonin creams you can buy, and discuss why people use melatonin cream and how it may help you. Read on to see our picks for the best melatonin creams, the benefits of melatonin cream, and how to use melatonin cream.
By the way, if you’re also interested in trying oral melatonin as a sleep aid, check out MELO Labs. Our melatonin diffusers and powdered drinks are among the fastest-acting melatonin supplements on the market.
At a glance:
Best Melatonin Creams
In this section, we’ll give you a breakdown of some of the best melatonin skin creams on the market. As you’ll soon see, you have no shortage of options when considering a lotion or cream with a melatonin based formula, each with its own unique benefits.
Best Melatonin Cream for Skin Health
If you’re looking for nighttime skin rejuvenation, look no further: The ISDIN Melatonik Recovery Night Serum is designed to be anti-aging. It contains a proprietary blend of melatonin, bakuchiol, and vitamin C. Melatonin and Vitamin C are both powerful antioxidants, and bakuchiol is a plant extract with powerful anti-aging effects.
In fact, a study from the British Journal of Dermatology found bakuchiol to be as effective as retinol for reducing the appearance of wrinkles and dark spots, but it is also better-tolerated than retinol, making it a safer alternative to many anti-aging serums.
Shop ISDIN Melatonik Recovery Night Serum
Best Melatonin Cream for Soothing Irritated Skin
The Green Releaf Therapeutic Sleep Cream contains a long list of impressive ingredients, including melatonin, shea butter, and hemp seed oil. But the main ingredient is colloidal oatmeal, which has long been used to soothe irritated skin.
As explained by a review from the Journal of Drugs in Dermatology, colloidal oatmeal is cleansing, moisturizing, soothing, and anti-inflammatory, acting as a protective buffer on your skin. The combination of colloidal oatmeal with other soothing ingredients in this melatonin cream is sure to be healing and relaxing.
Shop Green Releaf Therapeutic Sleep Cream
Best Melatonin Cream for Anti-aging
If you’re looking for an option that’s free of fragrances, synthetic dyes, phthalates, parabens, gluten, soy, and animal products, you’ll be happy to know the melatonin mask from Alpyn Beauty has none of these ingredients. But what it does contain is even more impressive.
In addition to vitamin E, bakuchiol, and wild dandelion, this overnight mask also contains a hefty dose of hyaluronic acid, an important molecule involved in moisturizing skin that can have anti-aging effects.
Shop Alpyn Beauty – Natural Calming Melatonin Mask
Best Melatonin Cream for Aromatherapy
Looking for a lotion with a natural, calming scent to help you relax? The ASUTRA Melatonin Lotion contains almond oil and lemongrass oil, giving you a little boost of aromatherapy as you apply it. In addition, it has shea butter and magnesium.
In addition to promoting sleep, this night cream can help soothe eczema, fight joint pain, and reduce feelings of anxiety. It’s also one of the more economical options on this list.
Best Healing Melatonin Cream
The melatonin cream from Maxasorb has a small but impressive list of ingredients. After water, the next two ingredients are aloe barbadensis and coconut oil, two of the most healing and moisturizing natural ingredients you’ll find in any lotion. It also contains vitamin E, but it’s free of fragrances, making it a great option for those who don’t want an overwhelming scent.
According to a systematic review from the Iranian Journal of Medical Sciences, aloe is moisturizing and helps to heal wounds. Similarly, a review from the International Journal of Life Science Research suggests coconut oil is very moisturizing and also anti-aging, helping to reduce wrinkles.
Best Relaxing Melatonin Cream
For a lotion that will really relax your muscles, you may want to try Ancient Minerals Magnesium Lotion. This melatonin cream contains bioavailable magnesium as well as OptiMSM, a proprietary ingredient that helps magnesium be absorbed more quickly.
Magnesium oil has a very relaxing effect when applied directly to the skin, releasing tension in the muscles. Additionally, a clinical trial from the Journal of Integrative Medicine found topical magnesium could also relieve pain in patients with fibromyalgia (a chronic pain disorder).
Shop Ancient Minerals Magnesium Lotion
Best Moisturizing Melatonin Cream
The Miracle Plus Melatonin Skin Cream is one of the most moisturizing lotions we’re including here. The long list of ingredients includes a wide variety of essential oils and natural plant extracts, such as cocoa butter, hemp seed oil, avocado oil, lavender oil, lavender extract, grape seed oil, and chamomile extract.
Cocoa butter, one of the main ingredients, has a wide variety of uses and benefits. A study from Nutrients suggests topical cocoa butter is both an antioxidant as well as an anti-inflammatory agent, and it also protects against sun damage. Additionally, it is a very moisturizing ingredient.
Shop Miracle Plus Melatonin Skin Cream
Best Melatonin Sunscreen
Yes, you read that right: Melatonin can also be used in sunscreens! In fact, melatonin can help to protect against oxidative damage from the sun. The Dr. Dennis Gross Instant Radiance Sun Defense Sunscreen contains broad spectrum SPF 40, but more than just a sunscreen, it is also a tinted moisturizer. (It comes in two shades.)
Customers were thrilled with the way this made their skin look and emphasized that it isn’t like makeup. It also isn’t greasy like other sunscreens. And no, it won’t make you sleepy when you apply it, so you can put it on in the morning for a full day of sun protection without disrupting your sleep cycle.
Shop Dr. Dennis Gross Instant Radiance Sun Defense Sunscreen
The Benefits of Melatonin Cream
You might think melatonin cream is just for sleep, but it’s much more than that. Note that applying it to your skin won’t actually make you feel sleepy (though the other ingredients in some melatonin creams might). Instead, it gives you a wide range of health benefits, which make it an effective nighttime moisturizer.
This is because many skin cells contain melatonin receptors, so it is easily absorbed through the skin. As such, you can experience many of the same health benefits of melatonin from applying it to your skin as you can from taking it orally.
Melatonin for Anti-Aging
A study from Clinical, Cosmetic, and Investigative Dermatology found topical melatonin could reduce the effects of skin aging in women. Melatonin creams were found to improve skin tonicity and skin hydration while reducing skin roughness. Additionally, the study notes that topical melatonin products are generally well-tolerated.
With this in mind, it’s no wonder melatonin is a key ingredient in many of the above melatonin creams that boast anti-aging effects: Melatonin itself can help to rejuvenate skin. It’s a powerful antioxidant that can slow the effects of skin aging.
Additionally, keep in mind the natural hormone melatonin decreases with age, so in this way, it’s a good idea to take supplemented melatonin to ensure you have sufficient melatonin as you age. Many dietary supplements contain melatonin, but topical use of melatonin can help boost your melatonin levels as well.
Melatonin for Wound-Healing
Topical melatonin can also help wounds heal faster. A study from the American Journal of Translational Research suggests melatonin can accelerate the healing of surface cuts to the skin.
The study also suggests it’s particularly beneficial for wound healing in diabetics, whose wound healing process is often delayed. As the authors explain, topical melatonin helps to increase activity in important skin cells involved in the skin healing and process.
Melatonin for Eczema
Some evidence suggests topical melatonin can also help to heal atopic dermatitis, also known as eczema. A study from the Journal of Cellular Biochemistry suggests topical melatonin can help treat allergic inflammatory diseases, such as eczema.
The study explains the mechanism behind this effect: Topical melatonin can down-regulate mast cell activation. Mast cells are white blood cells that get produced in response to an allergic reaction, releasing histamine and creating inflammation or hives. By down-regulating the activation of these cells, topical melatonin can help to reduce skin inflammation.
Melatonin for Hair Regrowth
Androgenetic alopecia is the name given to the kind of hair loss that accompanies age. Genetics influences both the type and degree of hair loss as well as the age when you may start experiencing it, but everyone who lives long enough will eventually experience some hair loss.
A study from the International Journal of Trichology found melatonin cream to be a safe and effective treatment for androgenetic alopecia. In fact, many of the melatonin creams listed in the previous section have been reviewed for hair loss, and customers have generally been pleased to see hair growing back after regularly applying melatonin cream to their scalp.
Melatonin for Wound-Dressing
Melatonin may also be antimicrobial, making it part of an effective wound dressing. A study from the European Journal of Pharmaceutics and Biopharmaceutics found topical melatonin could be protective against Staphylococcus aureus (which causes the dreaded staph infection) as well as other types of bacteria.
Melatonin for Sun Damage
As we saw earlier when looking at the best melatonin sunscreen, topical melatonin also has photoprotective effects, meaning it can help to minimize UV damage from the sun’s rays. A review from the International Journal of Molecular Sciences claims topical melatonin can significantly reduce the damage associated with ultraviolet light radiation on the skin.
How to Use Melatonin Cream
Melatonin cream has a wide variety of benefits, but it’s not a powerful sedative. As we’ve already seen, applying melatonin lotion to your skin will not necessarily make you feel sleepy, though it may help to relax you.
NYC-based dermatologist Suzanne Friedler says topical melatonin hasn’t been shown to cause sleepiness, but it is still recommended to be used it at night. This is because it works most effectively when your body’s melatonin levels are naturally the highest, which happens at night. However, using a melatonin sunscreen during the day can also be effective.
Though it won’t promote sleepiness, it might improve sleep when used before bedtime. A study from Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics found melatonin could improve daytime sleep in shift workers. The study suggests the effects of topical melatonin are longer-lasting than oral melatonin, so it may also be useful for travelers suffering from jet lag.
In other words, while melatonin pills leave your system after a few hours, the effects of melatonin cream can be felt all throughout the night, or whenever your daily day night cycles happen to occur.
However you want to incorporate it into your skin care regimen, you can apply it anywhere on your skin. Use it on your scalp for hair regrowth, or on your face to reduce the appearance of aging, or on the insides of your wrists to get it into your bloodstream quickly, or anywhere you have eczema or skin irritation, etc.
Why You Should Combine Melatonin Cream and Oral Melatonin
We’ve covered a lot of info about melatonin creams, so let’s take a minute to do a quick recap. Try ISDIN Melatonik for its rejuvenating properties, Green Releaf for its soothing benefits, Alpyn Beauty for a boost of hyaluronic acid for its anti-aging properties, Ancient Minerals for the relaxing power of magnesium, or Dr. Dennis Gross melatonin sunscreen for additional sun protection.
While the above products all have plenty of bonus ingredients to improve your skin health, melatonin itself also has powerful effects on the skin. It has antioxidant and antimicrobial properties, it can stimulate hair growth, it can relieve eczema, it can accelerate wound healing, and it can help protect against sun damage.
However, note that you can get many of these same health benefits from taking oral melatonin. In fact, oral melatonin may have additional benefits over topical melatonin. For instance, a study from the British Journal of Pharmacology suggests melatonin can help to activate and regrow bone marrow.
And while melatonin pills only have an average of 15% bioavailability, liquid dietary supplements are much more effective, providing upwards of 98% bioavailability. Meanwhile, vaporizers are the most fast-acting option. MELO Labs makes a melatonin product in each of these categories.
Try MELO Labs for Your Oral Melatonin Needs
MELO Labs makes melatonin liquid in the form of MELO Sip, a powdered drink that can be added to water. In addition to melatonin, Melo Sip contains chamomile, valerian root, l-theanine, and GABA, making it a very relaxing drink to have before bed. It also has sleep-enhancing vitamins and minerals, but no added sugar or sugar alcohols. It gets its sweetness from monk fruit.
MELO Labs also makes MELO Air, a melatonin vaporizer with just three ingredients: melatonin, organic vegetable glycerin, and natural flavors. It has no harmful ingredients. As with Melo Sip, customers love the many flavors and find the product extremely effective. Because it doesn’t have to pass through your digestive system, Melo Air can get into your bloodstream right away.
Leave a comment