Today I'm reviewing a super budget-friendly skincare item that you can pick up from your local supermarket, well that is if you live in the UK and your local supermarket is Asda. Occasionally when I'm out getting my weekly shop I check out the skincare section, which is usually pretty limited but supermarkets are bringing out more and more of their own products and I do often wonder are they any good so a few months back I picked up the Vitamin C Radiance Boosting Serum from Asda.
This serum costs just £2.50 and you get 50ml of product which is pretty generous especially given the price, I will admit with such a low price I didn't have the highest expectations but I wanted to give it a try. The first week or two I used it a good few times but I felt it may be causing some breakouts so eventually I gave up and it lay in a drawer for a good few months untouched. Now I will say that I have combination skin that gets oily in my t-zone throughout the day and is a bit more dry on the outer perimeter of my face I have also suffered from adult acne to varying degrees for many years so it can be difficult to tell if a product is causing issues or if I'm just having a breakout so for this reason I decided to give the serum another go.
Since giving it another go I haven't noticed any more breakouts than I usually get so I've continued using the serum and surprisingly I've actually been enjoying it. It has a nice light texture that applies to the skin very smoothly and leaves you feeling hydrated and more radiant. I've had a look at the ingredients and parfum is listed quite high up on the list (about halfway), so although it does smell very nice there's a lot of fragrance being used which is something I'm trying to start paying more attention to, if your skin is sensitive to fragrance then this might not be the best product for you however if your other skincare products are fragrance free then you might not have any issues, it's all about balance. One of the other ingredients that sit away up at the top of the list is Propylene Glycol which I understand is a humectant meaning it will help pull moisture into the skin and also helps the skin to better absorb active ingredients, in this case, the Vitamin C. Speaking of which, Sodium Ascorbyl Phosphate is another ingredient that's right up at the top and this is a water-soluble, stable form of Vitamin C so the first few ingredients sound pretty good to me and there's also some other hydrating ingredients that are listed. I will also mention there's quite a bit of dimethicone being used in this serum which I don't believe does any good for the skin (or any bad) but it is used in a lot of primers which does make this a good serum to use as a base for make-up. I didn't look at every ingredient but towards the bottom there was also Limonene and Linalool which I believe can be quite irritating/sensitising to the skin which is worth noting even though they are near the very bottom of the list meaning there's not a lot being used, these coupled with the fragrance could make this serum a no-go for those with sensitive skin.
My skin can handle a fair amount, it isn't particularly sensitive and so this serum doesn't appear to be giving me any issues, my final thoughts are that this is a good basic serum that does do what it claims for a very very reasonable price. It might not be for everyone and may have some questionable ingredients but given how affordable it is I'm not mad at it. I think it's a great option to pick up last minute when your out shopping and you've run out of your usual serum, I would purchase it again in the future, in the longterm I think I'll look for something else however it's a good little back up to have/buy in a pinch.
