Bakuchiol

Bakuchiol is a meroterpene phenol extracted from the seeds and leaves of Psoralea corylifolia, a plant used for centuries in Ayurvedic and traditional Chinese medicine. Structurally it looks nothing like retinol. Functionally, it behaves remarkably similarly.

The reason it works is that bakuchiol influences many of the same genes retinol does. Gene expression studies have found it upregulates collagen types I and III and regulates matrix metalloproteinases, the enzymes that break collagen down. That combination is what produces the smoothing effect people associate with retinoids.

The most cited comparison is a 2019 randomised, double-blind trial published in the British Journal of Dermatology. Over twelve weeks, 0.5% bakuchiol twice daily and 0.5% retinol once daily produced statistically comparable reductions in wrinkle surface area and hyperpigmentation. The difference was tolerability: the retinol group reported significantly more stinging and scaling.

That tolerability is the whole point. Retinoids work, but a large share of people abandon them because of the purge, the flaking, and the sun sensitivity. Bakuchiol is not photosensitising and does not require the slow ramp-up a retinoid does, which means people actually keep using it long enough to see results.

Dhaliwal S, Rybak I, Ellis SR, Notay M, Trivedi M, Burney W, Vaughn AR, Nguyen M, Reiter P, Bosanac S, Yan H, Foolad N, Sivamani RK. Prospective, randomized, double-blind assessment of topical bakuchiol and retinol for facial photoageing. Br J Dermatol. 2019 Feb;180(2):289-296. doi: 10.1111/bjd.16918. Epub 2018 Sep 21. PMID: 29947134.