The Best Lip Balm for Dry Lips

For dry lips I would pick a balm that seals with butters, oils, waxes or petrolatum, and add SPF if you are outside. Here is where I would start, by what your lips need.

Best for cracked lips: La Roche-Posay Cicaplast B5 Lip Balm. Concentrated in panthenol, made for dry to extra dry lips, with a non-greasy texture.

Best overnight: Lanolips The Original 101 Ointment. A lanolin ointment the brand says to put on every night to wake up to supple lips.

Best with SPF: EltaMD UV Lip Balm Broad Spectrum SPF 36. 22% transparent zinc oxide, fragrance free and water resistant up to 80 minutes.

Best fragrance free classic: Kiehl's Lip Balm #1. Squalane and vitamin E, and a Kiehl's classic since the 1960s.

Best tinted: ILIA Balmy Tint Hydrating Lip Balm. Shea butter, rosehip oil and beeswax with sheer, buildable color.

Best glossy balm: Lancôme Lip Idôle Squalane-12 Butterglow. 12% squalane, and Lancôme says up to 24 hours of hydration.

Best everyday stick: Aquaphor Lip Repair Stick. Made without fragrance or parabens, and the brand says it soothes chapped, cracked lips.

A lip balm works by putting a physical barrier over skin that cannot make its own. Waxes, butters and petrolatum do that, while menthol and camphor only create the sensation of relief. Most of the balms here lead with the former. Lip balm sits in the odd position of being both a medical product and an accessory, and the market has never resolved which. The tinted versions are winning because they let you skip the choice.

Here is how my picks line up on format, what is in them, finish and size. Star ratings are what Ulta or the brand's own page showed on October 18, 2026, and every other detail comes from the brand or Ulta product page.

La Roche-Posay Cicaplast B5 Lip Balm. Balm · dry to extra dry lips · panthenol, shea butter, thermal spring water · non-greasy, fragrance free · 4.4 stars from 622 Ulta reviews

Lanolips The Original 101 Ointment. Ointment · overnight, daily or under lip color · lanolin · 4.6 stars from 1,387 Ulta reviews

EltaMD UV Lip Balm Broad Spectrum SPF 36. SPF balm · sensitive skin · 22% transparent zinc oxide, vitamin E, bisabolol · water resistant up to 80 minutes, fragrance free · 0.28 oz

Kiehl's Lip Balm #1. Balm · dry lips · squalane, vitamin E · fragrance free, paraben free · 0.5 fl oz

ILIA Balmy Tint Hydrating Lip Balm. Tinted balm · dewy finish · sea succulent, rosehip oil, shea butter, beeswax · subtle vanilla scent · 0.15 oz · 4.8 stars from 1,719 reviews on ILIA's site

Lancôme Lip Idôle Squalane-12 Butterglow. Tinted glossy balm · 12% squalane, shea butter, jojoba oil, ceramides · up to 24 hours of hydration, and Lancôme says lips look 27% less dry after 7 days

Aquaphor Lip Repair Stick. Stick · chapped, cracked lips · jojoba oil, shea butter, panthenol · made without fragrance or parabens · 4.7 stars from 2,834 Ulta reviews

Lip balms are easy to judge in the first minute and hard to judge after a week, so the test I would run lasts a week.

The setup. Seven days per balm, applied in the morning, after lunch and at bedtime, with nothing else on the lips. No lip scrub during the test.

What I would measure. Hours until lips feel dry again after the morning coat. Flaking, scored 0 to 3, on day one and day seven, with a close photo in daylight. For SPF balms, how many times a day I reapply when I am outside.

How I would read it. An ointment like Lanolips 101 is built for overnight, so the morning score is the one to watch. For cracked lips, I would expect La Roche-Posay Cicaplast B5 and Aquaphor Lip Repair to show the biggest change from day one to day seven. A tinted balm like ILIA Balmy Tint gets judged on the same numbers, plus how evenly the tint wears off.

What I would skip. Licking your lips during the test. It undoes every balm.

Reaching for a lip balm every ten minutes usually means the formula is evaporating rather than sealing. A good one should hold for a couple of hours through talking and drinking. Anything that needs constant topping up is failing quietly. The reapplication complaint has a real mechanism behind it rather than being a myth about addiction. Humectant-heavy formulas without an occlusive layer pull water up and let it evaporate.

When lips are actually cracked, I would reach for a plain repair balm before anything tinted. La Roche-Posay's Cicaplast B5 lip balm is concentrated in panthenol, made without fragrance, and the brand says it hydrates dry to extra dry lips with a non-greasy texture. Aquaphor's Lip Repair Stick is the brand's ointment in stick form, made without fragrance or parabens, and it says it relieves dryness and soothes chapped, cracked lips. Avène's Cicalfate+ is made for severely dry, cracked lips and is very water resistant, and Lanolips' Original 101 Ointment is the lanolin one, made to go on every night so you wake up to supple lips.

How to use it: put a thick layer on right before bed, then switch back to a lighter daily balm once the cracks close.

What I would skip: a scented or flavored balm on broken skin, since fragrance can sting.

I chose by what the balm is made to do: seal and repair cracked lips first, protect them from sun second, and add color last. Every product detail here comes from the brand or Ulta's product page.

Hands dry out the same way in cold weather, so see the best hand cream for dry skin. ILIA, Kulfi, MAC and Chantecaille have their own brand pages, and the skincare shop has the rest.

The best lip balm for dry lips is the one with an SPF in it if you are outside at all. Tint is a bonus rather than a reason to buy. Keep one in a coat pocket and stop buying replacements at the till. The SPF versions are the only genuinely important upgrade in this category. Lips have almost no natural protection. If you want to keep browsing, I also put together Lanolin Lip Balm and Why Very Dry Lips Like It and La Roche-Posay Cicaplast Lip Balm and Other Barrier Balms for Dry Lips.