DermoraStop guessing your skin type from a paper towel.
The classic advice is to wash your face, wait an hour, and press a tissue to your forehead. That measures one zone, on one morning, in one room's humidity. Dermora scores oil by zone, hydration, and barrier resilience from up to three selfies, so your skin type comes from measurement instead of a guess you made at the bathroom sink.
Free first analysis. No credit card required.
What actually determines your skin type
T-zone oil
Shine across the forehead, nose, and chin, scored separately from the rest of the face.
Cheek hydration
Water content in the outer face, where dryness and dehydration usually show up first.
Pore visibility
How prominently pores read by zone, which tracks closely with oil flow.
Barrier resilience
How much your skin can currently tolerate before it starts protesting.
Reactivity
Flushing, stinging, and irritation patterns that separate sensitive from simply dry.
Zone contrast
The gap between your oiliest and driest areas, which is what makes skin combination rather than one thing.
Blotting paper measures one morning; your skin is not one morning.
The wait-an-hour tissue test gives you a single reading from a single zone, taken on a day that might have been unusually humid, unusually stressful, or the day after you tried a new cleanser. It also flattens the face into one answer, which is why so many people come away convinced they are oily when only their nose is, or convinced they are dry when their barrier is simply irritated.
Scoring from photographs measures several zones at once and separates the signals that the tissue test collapses together. Oil and hydration are different things, and skin can be short on water while producing plenty of oil. Naming that correctly is the difference between reaching for a heavier cream and reaching for the thing your skin actually needs.
Your type shifts with season, age, and routine.
Skin type is not a permanent identity you get assigned once at nineteen. It moves with the weather, with hormones, with the actives you have been using, and with age. Plenty of people who were oily in their twenties are combination by their thirties and have no idea, because nobody re-measures. They keep buying for the skin they used to have.
Your first Dermora test is free and gives you the full picture: the type, the seven category scores behind it, and a routine built from them. Weekly re-testing on Plus is what catches the drift, so when your skin changes in February you find out in February rather than the following year.
Common questions about skin type test.
How do I know my skin type without a test?
You can get a rough sense by washing your face, waiting an hour without applying anything, and noticing where shine returns first and where skin feels tight. It is a reasonable starting point, but it reads one moment in one set of conditions and tends to miss the difference between dry skin and dehydrated skin, which need different routines.
Can my skin type change?
Yes, and it usually does. Oil production generally declines with age, hormones shift it in both directions, seasons move hydration significantly, and a harsh routine can push normal skin into a sensitised state that looks like a different type entirely. This is exactly why re-measuring beats deciding once and buying for that answer forever.
Is combination skin a real skin type?
It is the most common one. Combination simply means the gap between your oiliest zone and your driest zone is wide enough that treating the whole face identically will leave part of it wrong. Dermora scores zones separately, so a combination result comes with guidance on which areas need what rather than a single blanket recommendation.
Do I need to know my skin type before starting a routine?
It helps, because type determines texture and strength choices more than anything else on the label. That said, you do not need to work it out yourself first. The test and the routine come together in the same free analysis, so you get the type and the plan built from it in one pass.
Ready to see your scores?
Your first full analysis is free: seven category scores, your top priorities, and a routine you can start tonight.
Take my skin type test freeDermora provides cosmetic skin analysis and general skincare guidance. It does not diagnose, treat, or replace care from a board-certified dermatologist.