No7’s new anti-ageing serum resets 'skin jetlag’ – here's why you should use this range round the clock (2025)

We all know that a good night’s rest is crucial for skin regeneration – it’s not called beauty sleep for nothing. However, No7 claims to have set a new performance high for the night shift with its latest anti-ageing blockbuster.

Future Renew Damage Reversal Night Serum features a ‘breakthrough’ technology that, according to Boots scientists, is clinically proven to reawaken flagging, out-of-sync skin-repair genes. The result? Damaged skin gets visibly restored as we sleep, and our faces look younger.

Future Renew Night Serum is the latest arrival in the booming area of chronobiology, which aims to ‘hack’ our circadian rhythms and supercharge what our body is designed to do at night anyway.

The science itself is quite mind-boggling, but the bottom line is easy to understand: in trials, 100% of the new night serum’s testers saw visible signs of skin damage reversing, including under-eye wrinkles. (Keep scrolling for our own review.)

Not at all, it's more of a nighttime partner to the original serum. While the aforementioned results come from using the new night serum alone, No7 says you'll see them faster if you tag-team the two products.

In 2023, the first Future Renew Serum became the UK’s biggest-ever beauty launch after its super-peptide tech was proven to address lines, pigmentation and loss of firmness, and give 'five years of wrinkle reversal', according to No7’s head of science research, Dr Mike Bell.

The latest round of clinical trials has shown that using the original and the new product as day and night serums in the same regime dramatically accelerates the speed at which you'll see anti-ageing results.

The new night serum is powered by pioneering research into how skin works at night. Partnering with the University of Manchester, No7 tested skin from 20 women aged 50-plus at different points around the clock, comparing sun-exposed forearm samples with sun-protected buttock samples.

Not only did they find that a number of skin repair genes worked to a circadian rhythm, there was a ‘rush hour’ between 2am and 4am. ‘We found that nighttime was really busy – almost two thirds of the [circadian rhythm] genes were peaking in their expression at nighttime,’ says Dr Vicki Newton, No7 senior research scientist. ‘They included proteins that remodel the skin and act as scaffolding, so they’re really important if you’re laying down new collagen and elastin. We found that collagens were peaking as well.’

However, not all repair genes were as prompt and efficient as others. ‘We found the body clock system doesn’t work as well in sun-damaged skin,’ says Dr Newton. Not only was there less repair activity, it was weaker, less coordinated and it switched on later than in non-sun exposed skin. ‘There’s this weird “jetlag” going on,’ says Dr Bell. ‘For the first time, we’ve shown that chronic sun exposure disrupts circadian rhythm.’

Finding the problem was step one, finding a solution for jet-lagged skin genes was next. ‘We found a very interesting extract called lindera strychnifolia,’ says Dr Bell. ‘When we added it to skin cells, it strengthened and resynchronised circadian rhythms.’ In other words, these repair genes were back in the same time zone, and working as one happy, skin-regenerating team again.

If lindera strychnifolia is the jet-lag fix, Future Renew’s anti-ageing super-peptides are the final destination. The new night serum brings the two together for a supercharged tech that syncs with skin’s peak overnight repair hours. As a smart extra touch, the serum contains Dreamscentz, a scientifically-validated functional fragrance to get you in the mood for sleep.

According to No7, the new night serum has been proven in clinical trials to reverse multiple damage signs, including lines, under-eye wrinkles, uneven tone and a feeling of laxity. Testers have also reported improvements to tired skin giveaways such as puffiness, under-eye bags and dark circles.

While No7's research indicates you should start to see benefits in a few weeks, clinical testing over six months showed that results from the new serum continued to get better over time. Interestingly, the anti-ageing results achieved with the night serum alone after 24 weeks were seen in half the time when the original serum was used every morning, too. (The research was done as a 'split face' trial, where the two regimes were compared side by side on each volunteer's face – in case you're wondering how they figured this one out.)

GH beauty director Lynne says: ‘I’m incredibly lucky to be sent a lot of skincare to test as part of my job, and I’m forever swapping new products into my regime. Whether it’s a new vitamin C, cleanser, peel, gadget or SPF, I like to try any addition for a month at a time to assess its effects. However, there’s one thing I’ve kept as my skincare baseline ever since it launched, and that’s the original Future Renew Serum.

The pioneering science and published, peer-reviewed clinicals reeled me in, but it’s what I’ve seen in the mirror has kept me hooked. I started to notice a difference within weeks, and I’m 100% on board with No7’s research that shows sticking with it pays dividends.

And since using it daily has worked very well, why not do it twice? For the past three weeks, I’ve added the new night Future Renew into my regular bedtime regime, using it either as my only serum or with a retinol.

The ‘relaxing’ scent is very subtle but the silky skin feel is unmissable, making for a sensorially pleasing end to the day. Some evenings, it’s moisturising enough for me on its own, although there’s no pilling if I do decide to layer on a separate night cream.

So far, I’m impressed with how well it’s working. As a born worrier, my sleep is notoriously patchy and I’m frequently awake at the exact hours when my skin genes are hitting the peak repair zone. This isn't ideal, but at least I can comfort myself with the thought that using this serum is compensating to some extent for my restless duvet rustling. (Obviously, wearing it and being asleep at 2am would be better – but it’s a work in progress.)

What I will say is that, even on nights when I’ve barely scraped four hours, my skin doesn’t look or feel as tired as it deserves to. So, in the absence of blissful oblivion, Future Renew will more than do.’