What is the Difference Between Sunblock and Sunscreen?

Is there a difference between sunblock and sunscreen? Technically yes, however labeling and common usage tend to use the two terms interchangeably. However there a difference.

Both sunblock and sunscreen will protect your skin from UVA and UVB light (aging rays and burning rays), they use different chemicals and those chemicals work in different ways, which is why different terms are used.

Sunblock works like a mirrored shield. It contains minute particles of reflective material. They reflect the sun’s rays away from your skin blocking the damaging rays from ever reaching at all.

The ingredients included in sunblocks include Titanium dioxide and zinc oxide. (This includes Powder Sunscreen and Mineral Makeup.)

Early formulations of sunblock were often opaque, appearing as a thin, pale or white film over your skin. Current formulations are transparent to the eye, while still protecting against the sun, however some methods of blocking the sun in extreme cases still exhibit the extreme white glare.

When you see someone with a blazing white nose covered with zinc oxide ointment, you know that person is using a sunblock that will protect their skin close to completely. Some people use the term sunblock only for this sort of formula, because it blocks the sun’s rays so completely.

A sunscreen works in a way more like a sponge: where the sunblock reflects the beams away from your skin, the sunscreen soaks them up before they can reach you. Those rays that escape have been altered in wavelength, so that they are no longer in frequencies that endanger the skin.

The ingredients that are most often found in sunscreens include PABA, Benzophenones, Cinnamates, Salicylates,

The amount of chemical in the formula for a sunscreen or a sunblock determines how much sun can get in. A small amount of chemical allows a comparatively large amount of UV light through, just like a screen allows a slightly reduced amount of sunlight and air through compared to an open, unscreened window. This is where the term sunscreen comes from: the screening effect of the formula, which allows light through.

The more chemical, the more completely the screen cuts off UV light, preventing it from reaching your skin. A small amount of chemical lets through quite a lot of light. A large amount can block penetration pretty nearly completely.

Does the Difference Between Sunblock and Sunscreen make one better than the other? Not at all, it is a personal preference. Many of the newer formulations contain both sunblocking and sunscreeining ingredients. The most important things is the SPF number - it indicates the strength of the product. See What Does SPF mean?

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