Walking Does More for a Puffy Face Than Most Products
Medically reviewed by
4 independent reviewers
Andrew Conrad Barile, PT, DPT
Doctor of Physical Therapy (DPT) | Licensed Physical Therapist (PT) | CEO and Founder, Xtreem Pulse LLC
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Dr. Andrew Conrad Barile is a Doctor of Physical Therapy and the CEO and Founder of Xtreem Pulse LLC, the engineering company behind PureLift. He earned his Doctorate in Physical Therapy from Daemen College and is a licensed physical therapist.
He brings over two decades of clinical and entrepreneurial experience across physical therapy, craniosacral therapy and medical device innovation, built on a working knowledge of human anatomy and muscle physiology.
For PureLift LAB he reviews how current is delivered across all ten levels, from sub-sensory nanocurrent and skin-level microcurrent to motor-level EMS, and how the Infuse pass fits into the same ten-minute routine.
Bertica M. Rubio, M.D.
Board-Certified Physician, Dartmouth Medical School | Medical Director, Antiaging Regenerative Medicine Clinic
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Dr. Bertica M. Rubio is a board-certified physician and Medical Director of the Antiaging Regenerative Medicine Clinic in Redlands, California. She earned her Doctor of Medicine from Dartmouth Medical School and completed her pediatrics residency at UC Irvine Medical Center.
With decades of clinical experience, she specialises in age management medicine, regenerative medicine, wound healing and growth factor therapies, and her practice integrates evidence-based medical science with advanced aesthetic treatment.
For PureLift LAB she reviews articles for medical accuracy across the whole dial, from the gentle nanocurrent and microcurrent settings through to muscle-level EMS and the Infuse pass.
Daniel Grinberg, MD, FACS
Board-Certified Otolaryngologist | Head and Neck Surgeon | Fellow, American College of Surgeons | Mount Sinai
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Daniel Grinberg, MD, FACS is a board-certified otolaryngologist and head and neck surgeon at ENT and Allergy Associates in West Nyack, New York. He earned his medical degree from Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons.
He completed his otolaryngology residency at New York University Medical Center, serves as Assistant Clinical Professor at Mount Sinai School of Medicine, and is a Fellow of both the American College of Surgeons and the American Academy of Otolaryngology.
For PureLift LAB he brings a wider clinical lens, connecting at-home facial stimulation from microcurrent to EMS to the anatomy underneath, with the same rigour we apply to every device specification.
Prof. Dr. med. Ivo Buschmann
Chair of Angiology, Medizinische Hochschule Brandenburg | Clinic Director, University Clinic for Angiology
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Prof. Dr. med. Ivo Buschmann is Chair of Angiology at the Medizinische Hochschule Brandenburg Theodor Fontane and Clinic Director of the University Clinic for Angiology at the Brandenburg University Hospital.
He trained at the University of Hamburg, was a Max Planck Society Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Heart and Lung Research, and held senior consultant posts at the Charite Universitatsmedizin Berlin before his appointment as Chair in 2016.
One of Europe's leading authorities on arteriogenesis, with over 150 peer-reviewed publications and US and EU patents, he reviews for PureLift LAB how the evidence on electrical stimulation is read and where its limits lie.
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Lymph moves through three mechanisms, and two of them, muscle contraction and the movement of breathing, happen continuously whenever you are up and moving.
This article explains what is actually happening, such as:
- Why movement is the mechanism
- The overnight problem
- The desk problem
- The second benefit, which is circulation
- What this does not replace
and many more!
Nobody sells this, which is why it appears at the bottom of articles rather than the top.
Key Points:
The lymphatic system has no pump and relies entirely on movement and outside pressure.
Seven hours lying still is why the face is puffiest on waking and settles once you are up.
A desk day is a milder version of the same problem.
Exercise also raises circulation, which is the colour half of how skin looks.
None of this replaces the muscle work a device does, which is a separate mechanism.
Why movement is the mechanism
Blood has a heart. Lymph has one-way valves and nothing driving it, so it moves when something squeezes it: a muscle contracting around a vessel, the rise and fall of the diaphragm, or pressure applied from outside.
Walk and every one of those is happening, continuously, throughout the body including the neck where the facial drainage route ends.
That is why facial puffiness settles an hour or two after you get up regardless of what you apply, and why it is worst at the moment you have been most still.
The overnight problem
Seven hours horizontal means the two internal mechanisms are barely operating and gravity is no longer helping fluid down the neck.
So fluid collects in the face, and it shows most under the eyes where the skin is thinnest.
Sleeping with your head slightly raised helps because it restores a little of the gravity assistance, which is a small change with a visible morning difference.
The desk problem
A day sitting still is a slower version of the same thing, and people who work at a desk often notice their face looks heavier by mid-afternoon.
Getting up every hour does more for that than anything on your desk. Two minutes of walking restarts the mechanism.
Shallow breathing contributes too, since the diaphragm is one of the three pumps, and people at a screen tend to breathe shallowly for long stretches.
The second benefit, which is circulation
Skin colour comes largely from blood in the fine vessels of the dermis, and exercise raises blood flow throughout the body.
That is why people look well after exercise and why sedentary weeks show in the face as a flatter, greyer tone.
Smoking works in the opposite direction on the same mechanism, which is the single most documented influence on facial circulation there is.
What this does not replace
Movement addresses fluid and circulation, both of which are same-day effects that come back tomorrow.
Muscle tone in the face is a separate question and general exercise does not address it, since the facial muscles are not loaded by walking. That is what EMS does, and Kavanagh and colleagues measured an 18.6 percent increase in cheek muscle thickness over 12 weeks of motor-level stimulation (10.1111/jocd.12007).
So the two are complementary rather than competing, and neither is a substitute for the other.
The honest ranking for a puffy face
Sleep, adequate and at a sensible hour, with the head slightly raised.
Movement, starting with getting up and walking around in the morning.
Water, less salt, less alcohol.
Then drainage strokes or a low-level device pass, which is the third mechanism used deliberately.
The first three are free and outrank the fourth, and we would rather tell you that than pretend the order is reversed.
For the drainage strokes, see drainage massage technique, and for the mechanism in full, the science behind facial depuffing.