Can Nail Oils Really Help Nails Grow Faster?

This question is an example of how important it is to use the correct words when speaking about nails and nail products or you may fool yourself into thinking things that are not true! No cosmetic, including nail oils, can make the nail grow any “faster”.

Nail Oils: The Truth About Growth Claims

Anything that can make the nail grow faster or speed up growth is considered a medical drug, not a cosmetic. Such a claim is not allowed for cosmetic products; currently, no known medical drugs can speed up nail growth. Nor are there any vitamins which can make the nails grow faster. Some improperly claim that biotin makes the nail grow faster, but there is very little evidence of this.

There is a very limited amount of evidence that biotin can reduce nail plate brittleness, but there have only been a few small studies and a few dermatologist claims it helped a few patients, but not most.  

How Nail Oils Help Nails Grow Longer Without Speeding Up Growth

High quality nail oil can help the nail to grow longer. How is that? Isn’t this also a medical drug or medicine claim? No, it is not the same as speeding up nail growth. To make the nail grow “faster” requires making the nail matrix work faster to produce nail cells more quickly. No cosmetic can do this and it is not an allowed cosmetic claim.  

How Nail Oils Reduce Brittleness and Strengthen Nails

When certain nail oils absorb into the nail plate, they concentrate between the layers in the upper part of the nail plate where most of the plate’s brittleness occurs.

The oils add lubrication between these layers, allowing them to slide more easily and therefore bend more easily without breaking. Unlike biotin, there is plenty of evidence that penetrating nail oils do indeed reduce brittleness of the nail plate and that they work fairly quickly!

Penetrating nail oils contain “lipids”, naturally occurring fatty acids and their derivatives, which absorb to add flexibility and reduce brittleness making the nail plate tougher and less likely to break. They can allow the nail plate to grow longer than it normally would, rather than to break off just past the free edge.  

It is perfectly reasonable to expect a good quality nail oil to “help” the nail plate grow longer; while it is unreasonable to expect any cosmetic product or supplement to make the nails grow faster. 

Skip Supplements: Use High-Quality Nail Oils for Better Nail Health

My advice is to skip the nutritional nail growth supplements and use a high quality, absorbing nail oil regularly to improve the condition of the nail plate.

These are far more likely to help the nail growth than biotin or any other nail supplement. I recommend using professional quality nail oils, especially those which contain low viscosity, light weight oils such as avocado oil.

Heavy oils and waxes are less likely to penetrate in significant amounts. Keratin doesn’t penetrate the nail plate either, and will remain on the surface. A good rule of thumb to remember is, any oil that won’t quickly penetrate the skin is very unlikely to penetrate the nail plate.