Skip to main content

How To Keep Glasses From Fogging When Wearing A Face Mask

How To Stop Glasses From Fogging Up


Wearing face masks may be the new normal but for those of us who wear glasses, dealing with the glasses fogging up is probably one of the biggest inconveniences. It's not a new problem as surgeons can attest to. Here are a couple of simple hacks on how to keep your glasses from fogging up when wearing a face mask.

Why Do Glasses Fog Up When Wearing A Face Mask?

Why do glasses fog up in when we wear face masks in the first place? Face masks direct most of the air we exhale upwards where it makes contact with the lenses of our glasses.

Fogging occurs when the warmer water vapor from our breath condenses on the lens which are cooler. Tiny droplets form as a result and this scatters light and reduces the contrast of the lens.

These water droplets form because of the surface tension between the water molecules. If there was a way to reduce this tension, it would cause the water molecules to spread out evenly in a transparent layer instead.

Now that we know what causes our glasses to fog up when we wear a face mask, here are some simple and inexpensive fixes for the problem.

How To Stop Glasses From Fogging When Wearing A Face Mask

Hospital staff and particularly those working in operation theaters have faced the problem of fogging glasses for a long time now and have come up with some innovative solutions to prevent the annoying and potentially dangerous phenomenon from happening in the first place.

Soap and Water

Dawn Dish Soap
Regular Dawn Dish Soap
The simplest fix involves washing your glasses with soap and water just before you put on your face mask. Simply apply a single drop on both sides of the lens and rub with your fingers before rinsing it off. You can leave the glasses to dry or wipe the lens with a soft tissue before wearing them again.

The transparent layer of soap that's left behind prevents your glasses from fogging up for a while.

The best type of soap to use would be something like the original Dawn dish soap. You should avoid anything that's made for sensitive skin or has some type of lotion in it. These lotions will get smeared all over the lens and make them even more blurry.

Shaving Cream

Gillette Shaving Foam
Gillette Shaving Foam
If you don't have any non-moisturizing soap handy, there's no need to fear. You can achieve the same effect with shaving cream.

Just dab a little bit onto both sides of the lens and rub it on the lens. After which, you should wipe the lens with a soft fabric cloth.

Like with soap, shaving cream creates a protective layer on the lens that reduces the surface tension and stops water droplets from forming. 

Another trick to try - squish a folded tissue between your mouth and the mask. It will absorb the warm, moist air and prevent your lenses from clouding up.

Defogging Sprays

Optix 55 Fog Gone Anti Fog Spray
Optix55 Fog Gone Anti-Fog Spray

Shaving cream and dish-washing detergent are good hacks but if you need something a little more long-lasting, then it's time to turn to the professional solutions.

Fogging is a problem faced not just by medical professionals but snorkelers, divers, hockey players, and drivers. Using defogging sprays is commonplace and you could use these sprays to keep your glasses from fogging for even longer than is possible with soap or shaving cream.

A popular defogging spray is FOG GONE by OPTIX 55. Users spray a coating and it lasts a day or just to be safe, every time after they wash the glasses.

Two Face Masks

If the price or sourcing of face masks isn't an issue, then some surgeons have found that wearing two face masks at the same time helps to stop your glasses from fogging. Wear an inner mask followed by an outer mask and then your glasses or visor. 

Given the shortage of masks at this point in time, this isn't so viable a solution anymore. Not to mention the increased waste it creates.

Summary

Stopping your glasses from fogging up need not be complicated or expensive. If you do not wish to purchase specialized defogging sprays, then ordinary household items like dish soap and shaving cream can do the trick.

I hope you've found the above article useful. There are a few affiliate links to products on Amazon that will help to stop the droplets from forming on your glasses. Clicking on them will not cost you any more and this site will earn a small commission from your purchase that helps to maintain the site. 
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

How to View YouTube Shorts in the Regular YouTube Player

YouTube's "Shorts" is YouTube’s answer to TikTok and Instagram reels but let’s be honest, the YouTube Shorts player lacks some functionality, such as the ability to fast forward and go back in the video. However, you might be surprised to know that every video that loads in the "Shorts" player is actually a regular video, and by changing the URL slightly, you can load the same video in the regular player along with all the functionality of a traditional YouTube video. Changing the URL Changing the URL is the easiest way to switch the player from a technical standpoint. It’s so easy even your grandma can do it, as long as she knows how to type an address into the address bar of a browser.   Let’s use this super popular short video about AI taking over ping pong as an example. Look in the URL bar of a video playing in the "Shorts" player, where you should see the text Shorts/. Replace that text with watch?v= and load the new URL. So in this...
Post a Comment
Read more

Create QR Codes in Excel With VBA

Need to automate the creation of QR Codes? Excel and VBA can help with that! Here's how to do it in less than 15 lines of code. What we're looking to do is have a URL in a cell and then we're going to use a function that we create in VBA call Google APIs to create the code. Here's a video that explains the whole process of creating a user defined function in VBA that will create QR Codes: Code to create QR Codes in Excel with VBA Open up your Visual Basic editor and insert the following code and then save. To call the function, type =GETQRCODES(Cell Address) where Cell Address is the address of the cell which contains a URL that you want to send your user to. Function GETQRCODES(QRCode As String)     Dim URL As String     URL = "https://chart.googleapis.com/chart?chs=100x100&&cht=qr&chl=" & QRCode     ActiveSheet.Pictures.Insert(URL).Select     With Selection.ShapeRange(1)         .Name = "QR_CODE_" & QRCode...
Post a Comment
Read more

How To Turn Bluetooth On Windows 11

  Need to connect your Bluetooth device to a Windows 11 computer? You need to turn on Bluetooth on Windows 11 first. Here are all the ways to do so in Windows 11, including the Bluetooth Network Connections and Device Manager. 1. Quick Settings Menu Quick Settings menu usually found on the bottom right of the Windows Taskbar The easiest way to turn on Bluetooth on Windows 11 is to use the Quick Settings menu. The Quick Settings menu is the group of indicators that can be found on the bottom right of the screen, next to your date and time on the taskbar. Expanded Windows 11 Quick Settings menu that shows if Bluetooth is enabled Check whether the Bluetooth icon is colored. If it is, then Bluetooth is already turned on. If it is grey, click the Bluetooth icon to turn it on. Once you have clicked the Bluetooth icon, it will be colored, to indicate that Bluetooth has been enabled on Windows 11. By default, Bluetooth should already be listed in the Quick Settings list. If you...
Post a Comment
Read more