Decoded Korea

A sunscreen formulated for sale in Seoul cannot always be sold as-is in New York, Paris, or São Paulo. Each country maintains its own list of permitted UV filters, and the lists rarely match. A filter that is legal at 10% in one market may be banned in the next, or capped at 5%, or allowed only in specific product types. We mapped UV filter approvals across 10 markets — the EU, Korea, Japan, China, Taiwan, ASEAN, the US, Canada, Brazil, and Argentina — using a structured database of 21,796 cosmetic ingredients with 30,960 regulatory records. Below is what the data shows. What every country agrees on Two UV filters are approved in all 10 markets: Zinc Oxide — mineral filter, broad spectrum (UVA + UVB) Titanium Dioxide — mineral filter, UVB and partial UVA These are the only filters with universal approval. Any formulation designed to sell identically across all 10 markets without reformulation must rely on these two ingredients. This is why most global brands lead with minera...