What Exactly Are Freckles & How Do You Get Them Safely?

Gone are the days of hiding your freckles under a layer of foundation. In the last few years, the hype around freckles has reached fever pitch—with even non-freckled folk wondering how they can secure a dusting of dots over their features. 

Freckles are technically a type of sunspot. When your skin experiences inflammation from UV radiation, it can produce extra pigment, or melanin. But that overproduction can look a bit different depending on the person: Sometimes, it leaves a dusting of freckles; other times, it's hyperpigmentation and dark spots.

Another scientific note: Technically, "freckles" is an umbrella term for two specific types of spots: ephelides and solar lentigines. While both ephelides and lentigines are affected by sunlight, ephelides are largely genetically determined and tend to appear during early childhood, whereas lentigines are typically induced by photodamage of the skin. So if you've had a freckled face since the early days, it's not that you spent too much time in the sunshine—you were just genetically predisposed to those types of spots. And if you notice a cluster of new spots cropping up after a day under the sun, those are likely of the lentigine variety. 

Unfortunately, no—sun exposure is the only thing that can cause those spots to appear. And baking in the sun in the hopes of cute, sun-kissed spots is not a great idea. However, many clean beauty fans are now starting to embrace enhanced and fake freckles. Yep, freckles are becoming a makeup look in their own right, and people are experimenting with ways to amp up the pigmented dots sans UV exposure.

While real freckles can only appear after sun exposure (and may depend on your genes), you can always use makeup to create a freckled look or enhance the spots you already have, no harmful UV rays necessary. The best part about the freckle momentum? Say you wake up to a pesky blemish on your chin: A dot of freckle makeup, and poof—it's a brand-new beauty mark.