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5 top cruelty free sunscreens to protect your skin (and the animals)

Want to shop more consciously for your sun protection? These popular cruelty free sunscreens are free from animal testing and provide SPF 50 protection for your skin.
MoleMap Team
August 14, 2023
8 minutes

There’s no ques­tion about the impor­tance of wear­ing sun­screen every day to pro­tect your skin against the sun’s UV rays. But it’s also impor­tant to shop eth­i­cal­ly and con­scious­ly where you can. Thank­ful­ly, many skin­care brands offer cru­el­ty free sun­screens that also pro­vide high-lev­el UV pro­tec­tion so you can feel good about lath­er­ing up.

Cru­el­ty free sun­screens have been devel­oped with­out test­ing on, harm­ing or killing ani­mals. This means that they use alter­na­tive test­ing meth­ods for new prod­ucts and ingre­di­ents to assess the safe­ty of their fin­ished products.

If you’re search­ing for an SPF 50 sun­screen that offers great pro­tec­tion for your skin and does not test on ani­mals, check out our below round-up of 5 top cru­el­ty free sunscreens.

Dis­claimer: MoleMap is not affil­i­at­ed with any of the prod­ucts or brands men­tioned in this arti­cle and does not endorse any par­tic­u­lar prod­uct or brand of sun­screen. All infor­ma­tion regard­ing the prod­ucts’ cru­el­ty-free sta­tus was accu­rate at the time of publishing.

SPF 50 sun­screen that offers great pro­tec­tion for your skin

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Ultra Vio­lette Queen Screen SPF 50+ Lumin­is­ing Skin­screen Serum

Ultra Vio­lette vows to ​“make SPF that you (and your skin) will love.” And with hun­dreds of five-star reviews on their web­site and count­less shoutouts across social media, it seems their Queen Screen SPF 50+ Lumin­is­ing Sun Serum is exact­ly that.

The broad spec­trum SPF 50+ sun­creen is oil-free with a glowy fin­ish, designed to feel as luxe as an expen­sive skin­care serum. The milky, light­weight for­mu­la is easy to apply, invis­i­ble on the skin and plays well with both make­up and skincare.

Ultra Violette’s sun­screen is also proud­ly cru­el­ty free. Accord­ing to the company’s web­site, they ​“have vet­ted our sup­pli­ers, down to an ingre­di­ent lev­el and would nev­er work with any­one who test­ed on animals.”

Key ben­e­fits:

  • Cru­el­ty free
  • Broad spec­trum SPF 50+
  • Free from parabens and oxybenzone
  • Aus­tralian made and owned

Edi­ble Beau­ty Bask­ing Beau­ty Nat­ur­al Sun­screen

Edi­ble Beauty’s Bask­ing Beau­ty Nat­ur­al Sun­screen not only cares for your skin with broad spec­trum UVA/UVB SPF 50 sun pro­tec­tion, but it also cares about our ani­mals and our oceans.

This reef-safe, cru­el­ty free sun­screen uses zinc oxide, which serves as a phys­i­cal sun bar­ri­er on top of the skin. If you haven’t used nat­ur­al sun­screen before, you may notice that it takes a bit longer to mas­sage into the skin than con­ven­tion­al chem­i­cal sun­screen for­mu­las. How­ev­er, a lit­tle extra elbow grease isn’t a con­cern for those seek­ing non-tox­ic sun protection.

It also offers up to 4 hours of water resis­tance, mean­ing you can swim or sweat with total sun pro­tec­tion — just remem­ber to reap­ply after dry­ing off (even if it’s been less than 4 hours since your last appli­ca­tion), as well as fre­quent­ly through­out the day.

Key ben­e­fits:

  • Cru­el­ty free, veg­an and ocean-friendly
  • Broad spec­trum SPF 50+ UVA/UVB pro­tec­tion with zinc oxide
  • 4 hours of water resistance
  • Aus­tralian made

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Bon­di Sands Dai­ly Mois­tur­is­ing SPF 50+ Fra­grance Free Sun­screen Lotion

If you’re look­ing for an afford­able cru­el­ty free sun­screen, Bon­di Sands Dai­ly Mois­tur­is­ing Face SPF 50+ Sun­screen Lotion comes in at a fair price point and is read­i­ly avail­able at gro­cery stores and pharmacies.

Offer­ing UVA and UVB pro­tec­tion, this water resis­tant sun­screen absorbs quick­ly into the skin and dries invis­i­bly, mean­ing no greasy or sticky white cast. The for­mu­la also has aloe vera and vit­a­min E for added hydra­tion, leav­ing your skin feel­ing moisturised.

Accord­ing to PETA, Bon­di Sands is con­firmed to be cru­el­ty free and does not test on animals.

Key ben­e­fits:

  • Cru­el­ty free and reef friendly
  • SPF 50+
  • 4 hours of water resistance
  • Aus­tralian made

Der­ma­log­i­ca Dynam­ic Skin Recov­ery SPF 50

While it may be at the prici­er end of the sun­screen spec­trum, Dermalogica’s Dynam­ic Skin Recov­ery SPF 50 has received rave reviews and many believe it’s worth the splurge.

This cru­el­ty free broad spec­trum sun­screen is enriched with antiox­i­dant-rich white tea to com­bat free rad­i­cal dam­age, as well as hyaluron­ic acid for intense hydra­tion and tripep­tide to boost col­la­gen and improve skin tex­ture. The medi­um-weight for­mu­la eas­i­ly glides onto the skin and sinks in for a seam­less finish.

Der­ma­log­i­ca has con­firmed that it is cru­el­ty free. Accord­ing to Cru­el­ty Free Kit­ty, Der­ma­log­i­ca does not test prod­ucts or ingre­di­ents on ani­mals, nor do their sup­pli­ers, and they do not sell their prod­ucts where ani­mal test­ing is required by law.

Key ben­e­fits:

  • Cru­el­ty free
  • Veg­an
  • Paraben free
  • Broad spec­trum SPF 50+

Mec­ca Cos­met­i­ca To Save Face SPF50+ Super­screen Oxy­ben­zone Free For­mu­la

If you’re look­ing for a cru­el­ty free sun­screen that plays well with make­up, Mec­ca Cos­met­i­ca To Save Face SPF50+ Super­screen Oxy­ben­zone Free For­mu­la was designed just for you.

This weight­less, non-greasy for­mu­la works well under foun­da­tion or on top of skin­care prod­ucts, while still offer­ing broad spec­trum SPF 50+ UVA and UVB pro­tec­tion. With a nat­ur­al mat­te and ​‘almost unde­tectable’ fin­ish, it won’t leave the skin with a white cast.

In August this year, Mec­ca respond­ed to a ques­tion on a Face­book post regard­ing their cru­el­ty free sta­tus and stat­ed: ​“We can con­firm that all of our in-house Sig­na­ture Line brands, includ­ing Mec­ca Cos­met­i­ca, MEC­CA MAX and the new­ly launched kit, are all cru­el­ty-free. We are against ani­mal test­ing at MEC­CA, and we do not con­duct, or ask any­one to con­duct, ani­mal test­ing on our behalf.”

Key ben­e­fits:

  • Cru­el­ty free
  • Veg­an
  • Oxy­ben­zone and sul­phate free
  • Broad spec­trum SPF 50+

What are the ben­e­fits of using cru­el­ty free sunscreens?

Buy­ing and using cru­el­ty free sun­screen has a pos­i­tive impact in many ways — and not just on your skin! It also:

  • Helps to save the ani­mals
    The num­ber one rea­son for choos­ing cru­el­ty free prod­ucts is to save ani­mals from the suf­fer­ing and death asso­ci­at­ed with live ani­mal test­ing. The Humane Soci­ety Inter­na­tion­al esti­mates that around 500,000 ani­mals die each year due to cos­met­ic test­ing alone.
  • Sup­ports eth­i­cal brands
    Anoth­er ben­e­fit of buy­ing cru­el­ty free sun­screen is that you’re putting your mon­ey into brands and com­pa­nies that pro­mote and employ more eth­i­cal prac­tices in the devel­op­ment and test­ing of their products.
  • Dri­ves pos­i­tive change
    As a con­sumer, you have the pow­er to spark pos­i­tive change with your pur­chas­ing habits. When you buy from cru­el­ty free skin­care brands, you make a state­ment against the com­pa­nies that still choose to test on ani­mals. If enough peo­ple refuse to buy from these com­pa­nies, this can dri­ve real change for ani­mal test­ing laws in future.
applying suncreen to avid skin cancer

Remem­ber to team your cru­el­ty free sun­screen with reg­u­lar skin checks

At MoleMap, we encour­age you to use SPF 50 sun­screen every day to pro­tect your­self against skin can­cer — and if you can use a cru­el­ty free sun­screen, even better!

There are a lot of myths about sun­screen out there, but we can assure you that it is per­fect­ly safe for dai­ly use. In fact, dai­ly sun­screen use reduces your risk of devel­op­ing melanoma by 50%.

In addi­tion to wear­ing sun­screen and UV pro­tec­tive cloth­ing every day, we also rec­om­mend that you get a skin can­cer check or a com­pre­hen­sive mole check every year to mon­i­tor any changes in your skin. Remem­ber, ear­ly detec­tion is always the best pre­ven­tion against skin cancer.

Make sure to schedule these regular checks at specialised skin cancer clinics for thorough examinations and peace of mind.

MoleMap Team

At MoleMap we check, detect and treat skin cancer. Find out how you can protect your skin at your nearest MoleMap skin cancer clinic.

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