Traveling the US for 3 months. Would like to get some tan while im here. Any advice on that area?

S/he was asking if your skin tone is either pale or very pale. Many people with very fair natural skin tones - typically people from Northern Europe, places like Ireland & the UK, Scandinavia, etc - do not tan, their skin just goes straight to burning. Basically their skin is very poor at producing melanin to protect itself from further damage. Of course, there is a spectrum for this. I can tan, but it's difficult for me to build color without burning unless I am very strategic about my sunscreen usage. I have to use it though, or I will burn.

I understand wanting to get a tan. I feel similarly to you... I know that tanning carries a risk, but I am okay with that as long as I'm being relatively safe about it. For one thing I am not out in the sun every day, at most once a week. Over the years I've gotten better about always wearing sunscreen and reapplying frequently. This summer I will still be laying out in the sun on occasion, but I'll be doing it wearing SPF 50/PA+++ on my face and SPF 30 on my body. Basically, I think you should wear a minimum of SPF 15 on your body and a minimum of SPF 30 on your face, and reapply every 1-2 hours or anytime after swimming. I used to do this at the beach and I would get a tan. Frequent reapplication is really the most important thing to keep you from getting a burn.

American sunscreens are terrible compared to ones from Europe, Korea or Japan. The best I can recommend is the Neutrogena Dry Touch for your face and then No-Ad for your body. (They don't need separate sunscreens, but I prefer to get slightly nicer, more expensive sunscreens for my face and then use cheap stuff on my body.)

/r/SkincareAddiction Thread Parent