Best Exfoliants for Dry Skin

Ranked by 10 mentions across Reddit · Updated November 2026

Top picks· 7

Reddit’s top pick

Multi-Acid Milk Peel AHA Exfoliating Solution

Prequel3 mentions

from $22

The why

Upper-arm roughness prompts one commenter to apply it three times a week.

“To get rid of the rough skin on my upper arms I apply Prequel Multiacid Milk Peel 3 times a week.”
— Reddit, r/30PlusSkinCare

One minus

Tingling can be genuinely uncomfortable

Good forDry Skin

Compare the top 5

	1 Prequel Multi-Acid Milk Peel AHA Exfoliating Solution	2 Cure Natural Aqua Gel Cure Gentle Exfoliator	3 Axis-Y PHA Resurfacing Glow Peel	4 COSRX AHA 7 Whitehead Power Liquid	5 Dr. Dennis Gross Alpha Beta Universal Daily Peel
	Top pick		Budget pick
Reddit mentions	3	2	1	1	1
Price	from $22	from $34	from $13	from $17	from $155
Better for	—	—	—	—	Dullness
Key ingredients	Glycolic Acid	—	PHA	Glycolic Acid, Niacinamide	Glycolic Acid, Salicylic Acid

Community take

For dry skin, Redditors recommend gentle physical exfoliants and acids to lift flakes and rough patches. Cure Aqua Gel and AHA products recur, while some users space peel-pad use every other day or longer.

What works

Gentle physical exfoliation helps remove dry, flaky spots.
AHA products are praised for shedding flakes and smoothing rough patches.
Some users find acid exfoliation helpful despite having dry skin.

Watch out for

Harsh exfoliants are less favored than gentler lactic acid.
The ZO Exfoliating Polish is described as quite pricey.

The full ranking

Lactic Acid 10% + HA
The Ordinary1 mention
Tretinoin nights can give way once weekly, when it helps with that bumpy feeling without making ruddiness worse.
“I'd just use it one night a week instead of your tretinoin.”
— Reddit, r/30PlusSkinCare
from $9
Exfoliating Polish
ZO1 mention
Tretinoin flaking is the niche: one user says it was the only scrub to remove their flakes.
“it’s the only scrub i’ve used that’s actually removed my flakey skin.”
— Reddit, r/tretinoin
from $65