Cherries Are Jam-Packed With Vitamins and Antioxidants, so Consider It Your Skin-Brightening Superhero

Pineapple and watermelon tend to get all of the credit as our fruit-favorite summer skin saviors. In addition to being picnic basket and beach snack staples (because, really, is it even a beach day if there isn't a bag of watermelon packed and ready in the cooler?), they also happen to be heavy hitters when they're used in our products: One is packed with enzymes, while the other is a full-on hydrating hero. But get ready to see another fruity fave making its way from our beach blankets into our beauty cabinets, because cherry—aka my favorite summer snack—has a whole lot to offer for our faces, too.

“Cherries contain anthocyanins which are a great source of antioxidants," explains board-certified dermatologist Shari Sperling, MD. "They also contain vitamins A, B, C, and E, which are great for keeping skin healthy, and they can help with pigmentation and skin rejuvenation.”

For anyone keeping track, that is four different vitamins that cherries have to offer, plus antioxidants. Vitamin C specifically is great for brightening and helping to fight off free-radical damage (aka aging), while vitamin A helps with cell turnover, which is where the skin rejuvenation that Dr. Sperling mentioned comes from. And vitamins B and E are known to be great hydrators, making cherries not only great for use on your skin in the summer, but also all year round.

Farmacy Beauty recently launched their first foray into cherry skin care—their Very Cherry Bright 15% Clean Vitamin C Serum, $62—in which they harnessed the properties of a tropical cherry called Acerola. "It’s a super-fruit known to have up to 20 times more vitamin C than lemon and 65 times more vitamin C than an orange," says Pamela Marcos, director of product development for the brand. "Acerola cherry can help brighten, firm, hydrate, and protect skin from environmental damage due to its vitamin C-rich, antioxidant properties."

Plus, it happens to smell really, really delicious. Shop that serum, plus some of our other favorite cherry-spiked beauty products, below.

In addition to cherries, these are the best natural sources for vitamin C. Plus,a bottle of this vitamin C serum sells every four minutes, so we tested it to see if it was worth the hype.