12 best hand creams from as little as 79p (2023)

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Your hands are one of the most used parts of your body and probably one of the most neglected. They are constantly exposed to hot and cold water, changing temperatures and chemicals from the kitchen and garden. Using hand cream is one of the easiest ways you can ensure you can keep yours in top condition.

How often should you be applying hand cream?

According to Dr Imogen Bexfield, skincare expert and founder of www.whiteswanaesthetics.co.uk, how often you apply hand cream depends on each individual and their skin type. As a general rule you should be applying a cream or lotion after you wash your hands – and preferably when they are still damp to lock in the moisture.

It’s also important to use a hand cream after you’ve come into contact with any chemicals, such as cleaning products, as they can extract moisture from your skin leaving hands dry and irritated.

What ingredients should you look for in a hand cream?

Dr Bexfield says you should always use an SPF on your hands. Hands are exposed to the sun 365 days a year, and a broad spectrum sunscreen will protect them from aging UV/UBA rays as well as harsh weather conditions. Vitamin E is a powerful antioxidant that can help nourish and protect the skin on the hands. Aloe Vera is an excellent ingredient for soothing irritated skin.

How we tested them

We’ve tested a selection of hand creams for a few days at a time, and each product was used according to the instructions for a week. Along with price, we took into consideration the consistency of the product, how easy it was to apply, any residue left on the skin, and any noticeable improvements, including hydration, reduced fine lines, and texture.

Hand creams are listed in price order

Lacura Moisturising Hand Cream

£0.79, Aldi (Available in store only)
Best for: Bargain hunters

Key specs – Volume, 75ml: How to use; Gently massage into hands as required

Lacura is Aldi’s skincare and beauty range and like it’s food products, many of them are much higher quality than the price tag would lead you to believe. The hand cream is a dream to use and worked best for our tester when applied at night for an intensive treatment. It’s quite a thick and heavy, and feels quite sticky at first, but this texture soon disappears as the cream absorbs into skin.

Garnier Intensive Restoring Hand Cream

£1.95, Superdrug
Best for: Nourishing hands

Key specs – Volume, 100ml: How to use: Apply to dry hands regularly

Garnier has half a dozen hand creams available but this is the newest in its range. This cream smelled gorgeously sweet, thanks to ingredients such as maple sap extract. It’s a very light, almost mousse-like cream, and disappears quickly after rubbing in leaving. After a few days use, our hands were visibly smoother – and the scent lasted for hours.

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NIVEA Hand Cream Intensive Nourishing Moisturiser 100ml

£2.99, Boots
Best for: Sensitive skin

Key specs – Volume, 100ml: How to use: Apply as required. Lasts for 24 hours

There’s something comforting about the scent of Nivea products and this hand cream is no different. From the old-fashioned smell to the great results and bargain price, this was one of our favourites. The lovely thick texture was easy to rub in, leaving hands feeling soothed and smoother. It’s a good one to use frequently as it doesn’t irritate the skin and contains almond oil, which is deeply moisturising.

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Burt’s Bees Rosemary and Lemon Hand Cream

£6.99, Feel Unique
Best for: Nature lovers

Key specs – Volume, 28.3g: How to use: Apply liberally for soft, smooth hands

As Burt’s Bees products are pretty close to entirely natural, this hand cream is great for sensitive skin. It contains shea butter and smells of herbs mixed with the zesty scent of lemon. It’s quite a greasy cream but absorbs quickly and leaves the skin thoroughly hydrated. It’s great if your hands need a quick boost and relieves any dry, flaky patches.

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No7 Protect & Perfect Intense Daily Hydration Hand & Nail Cream

£11.50, Boots
Best for: Sun protection

Key specs – Volume, 75ml: How to use: Smooth into hands any time they need a little extra care

Boots No7 Protect & Perfect range has created a buzz in the beauty idustry for all the right reasons over the past few years. This equally desirable hand cream is suitable for sensitive skin and, as it uses the same technology as the anti-ageing serum, claims to reveal younger-looking hands in two weeks. The formula has a creamy consistency, and is absorbed very quickly with no greasy residue or stickiness. It also contains a SPF 15. After several days of use it did seem to plump out lines and make skin look more even.

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Oregon Rescue Serum

£12.95, Amazon (Price at the time of writing)
Best for: Very, very dry skin

Key specs – Volume, 100ml: How to use: Use every night for best results or as regularly as desired.

Oregon is a specialist brand which includes naturally active products developed specifically to help manage skin and scalps prone to psoriasis. The Rescue Serum contains grape root, horse chestnut extracts, caffeine and zinc. It looks like a clinical product, but if you suffer from very dry hands, this is the cream for you. Our tester suffers from mild eczema and this is irritating: itchy and very flaky. Hand creams do go some way to alleviate symptoms but this serum went one step further and seemed to disappear our usual signs of eczema. After four days it had cleared up almost completely.

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Balanceme Super Moisturising Hand Cream

£14.50 (reduced to £10.90), Look Fantastic (Price at the time of writing)
Best for: Hydration

Key specs – Volume, 100ml: How to use: Rub a small amount into hands and nails and massage into the skin until absorbed

Balanceme natural skincare products are free from parabens, sulphates and silicones, and contain no artificial fragrances or colours. The hand cream is luxuriously thick and has a heavenly sagey, lavender scent that reminds us of a relaxing spa. A little goes a long way too, making it a cost effective choice. It’s a great cream to use at bedtime as the aromas evoke a feeling of calm.

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Moroccanoil Body Hand Cream

£20, Look Fantastic
Best for: Balanced skintypes

Key specs – Volume, 75ml: How to use: Massage into clean hands and nails throughout the day as needed

If you’re looking for a quick moisture boost for hands that aren’t necessarily suffering from dry skin, then this is great cream to use. It has a very strong fragrance – the original Moroccanoil scent, which is exotic and floral – which is initially quite overpowering and does linger for some time. It’s quite a thin, oily cream but not sticky and absorbs very easily. It contains argan oil and avocado oil, as well as cocoa, shea and mango butters, which help keep skin soft. Used regularly, our tester got comments about the fragrance and did notice softer skin. It’s quite pricey at £20 and a generous amount was needed to ensure hands felt adequately treated.

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Kiss The Moon Love Night Cream For Hands

£28, Wolf & Badger
Best for: Soothing skin

Key specs – Volume, 90g : How to use: Massage slowly into hands and cuticles before bed, taking time to breathe in the sleep-inducing aromas

Kiss The Moon is a brand devoted to ensuring their products deliver a good night’s sleep using 100 per cent natural ingredients. With this in mind, their hand cream is designed to be used at night time so that skin can benefit from the restorative powers of sleep. The cream is like a whipped mousse, thick and more of a balm than a cream. Using a generous amount, were were pleased to see that it melted into skin almost immediately with no greasy or sticky residue. Waking up, hands were certainly smooth and smelt of rose, too.

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D’Alchemy Spectacular Hand Therapy

£29.14, Love Lula
Best for: Vegan friendly

Key specs – Volume, 30ml: How to use: Massage into your hands a few times a day. Especially recommended for daily care of tired, dry skin with loss of firmness.

(Video) HEN DO HAUL / EPISODE 2 / MISS TO MRS

D’Alchemy as a brand uses natural products and nothing is tested on animals. This particular hand cream was vegan, too. It contains sandalwood, mandarin, grapefruit, cedar and vanilla. The cream itself was quite thin, so a fair amount was needed. It’s a pale yellow colour, and smelled very zesty and sweet – like a lemon drizzle cake. It’s a rather greasy cream and took a while to absorb into skin, but the delicious smell did last. It left a light film on our hands, but they definitely felt softer and more hydrated. We also felt it needed to be applied more often than some of other creams we tested.

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ishga Hydrating Hand Cream

£29.50, ishga
Best for: Healing hands

Key specs – Volume, 100ml: How to use: Apply to hands as often as desired

This hand cream contains ishga seaweed extract, argan oil, aloe vera, patchouli, mandarin, rose geranium, and smells very much like a spa product. The organic brand was born ‘from a passion of beauty, seaweed and science’ and uses Hebridean seaweed extract in its products. The cream is very light and oily in consistency but absorbs really and leaves no greasy residue. Our hands felt markedly smoother after only a couple of day’s use. This is a great cream to use frequently, as a little pea-sized blob goes a long way. Despite its high price, this cream would last a fair amount of time.

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Goldfaden MD Hands to Heart Anti-Aging Hand Treatment

£35, Space NK
Best for: Anti-ageing

Key specs – Volume, 88ml: How to use: Massage a liberal amount onto the hands, focusing on the top of the hands, until fully absorbed. Apply daily

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This is a very thin, light cream with no fragrance. It contains all the anti-ageing key ingredients; retinol, hyaluronic acid, along with vitamins C and E. It absorbs super quickly and leaves hands feeling soft. However, we did feel that we had to use the cream fairly frequently to keep hands feeling hydrated. Even though it feels oily after the initial application, there were no greasy after effects. With extensive it helped our hands look plumper and less wrinkled. It is on the pricey side but worth it for the anti-ageing element.

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