Tattoo aftercare, without the folklore

How do you look after a new tattoo?

Follow the instructions your artist gives you, because they know what they put in your skin and which products they trust. Broadly: keep it clean, keep it lightly moisturised, keep it out of the sun, and do not soak it. Sun exposure over years is the single biggest factor in how a tattoo looks long-term.

Your artist's instructions beat anything here

Aftercare advice varies between artists, and they are the ones who know the technique used and the products they have seen heal well. Where their advice differs from a general guide, follow theirs.

The general shape of healing

The full week-by-week timeline, with what each stage looks like: tattoo healing stages

First days: some redness, swelling and weeping of plasma and ink is normal.
First couple of weeks: flaking and peeling, often with the colour looking dull and cloudy underneath. This is normal and resolves.
Weeks to a month or so: the surface settles and the piece looks like itself again.

What genuinely matters

Do not pick or scratch the flaking. Pulling scabs pulls ink out with them, and that is how patchy healing happens.
Keep it out of pools, spas, lakes and the sea until it is fully healed. Submersion is an infection risk in a way that a shower is not.

How long to wait for each kind of water: swimming after a tattoo

Sunscreen, forever, once healed. UV is what fades a tattoo over decades, and it is the one factor entirely within your control.

When a new tattoo can take sunscreen, and which kind: sunscreen on tattoos

Do not over-moisturise. A thin film, not a thick layer — suffocating it does not help.

When to see a doctor rather than read more

Spreading redness, increasing rather than decreasing pain after the first few days, heat, pus, or a fever are signs of infection and want a doctor, not a forum. In New Zealand, Healthline is free on 0800 611 116 if you want to know whether it needs seeing today.

Nothing here is medical advice. It describes what normal healing usually looks like so you can tell when yours is not.