How To Prepare For Airplane Travel And What To Do To Recover When You Get Back

We love a spontaneous getaway or a bucket-list adventure, but let’s be real, travel can take a serious toll on your body. Whether it’s a quick flight or a long-haul journey, hopping between time zones and airplane cabins can leave you feeling dry, puffy, sluggish, and anything but radiant.

The good news? With the right rituals (and a little science on your side) you can offset the biological turbulence and help your body bounce back into balance fast. Here’s how to outsmart the side effects of travel, restore full-body flow, and the wellness tools to keep in your carry-on.

What Does Travel Do To Your Skin, Lymphatic System & Energy?

Protecting your health while on flights is important, but there are a few things that are often overlooked. Let’s break down how you can protect your skin, your lymphatic system, and your energy during your flights.

1. Skin dehydration and oxidative stress

Airplane cabins typically hover around 10–20% humidity, drier than the Sahara. This extreme dryness pulls moisture from the skin, weakening your barrier function and leaving you prone to dullness, irritation, and breakouts.

Travel also exposes you to increased oxidative stress from UV radiation at higher altitudes, triggering free radical production that can accelerate aging and inflammation. This oxidative stress can look like fine lines, breakouts, and increased dryness, especially if your travel skincare routine is off track.

2. Lymphatic stagnation and circulation issues

Long periods of sitting, especially at high altitudes, impede lymphatic circulation, the passive system responsible for detoxifying tissues and managing fluid levels. Without muscle movement or compression, lymph becomes sluggish and toxins and fluids can accumulate, resulting in puffiness, bloating, and a sense of “heaviness.”

At the same time, your venous return (blood flow back to the heart) also slows, which can reduce oxygenation and make you feel foggy and fatigued.

3. Jet lag, circadian disruption, and fatigue

Jet lag and time zone shifts suppress melatonin production, which impacts everything from sleep to immune function. Add cortisol spikes from rushing through airports and poor in-flight nutrition, and you’ve got a recipe for inflammation, disrupted digestion, and impaired recovery.

6 Tips For Plane Travel During Your Flight

Tip #1: Stay Hydrated to enhance cellular hydration for skin and fascia

Most of us think hydration is just about drinking water but it’s really about electrolyte balance, too. Without key minerals like sodium, potassium, and magnesium, your cells can’t retain moisture efficiently.

Try: High-dration Powder
Formulated with trace minerals, electrolytes, and skin-supportive nutrients, it helps restore cellular hydration, support fascia elasticity, fight fatigue, and keep your glow intact even at 35,000 feet.

Tip #2: Support your skin with Red Light Therapy

Red and near-infrared light penetrate the skin to stimulate mitochondrial function, increasing ATP (cellular energy) production. This helps cells repair faster, calm inflammation, and promote collagen synthesis.

Try: Red Light Face Mask, Red Light Neck Enhancer, and Light-Activated Glow Serum

Virtually weightless and easy to fit in any suitcase, all HigherDOSE Red Light devices come with travel adaptors, making these tools your go-to global skin support. Pack your Light-Activated Glow Serum, powered by hyaluronic acid, bioidentical collagen, and copper peptides, to enhance the benefits of red light therapy while boosting hydration, protecting your skin barrier, smoothing fine lines and wrinkles, and delivering antioxidants to keep your skin feeling fresh and radiant.

Bonus: Red light therapy may also help reset your circadian rhythm, supporting melatonin production and post-travel sleep quality, making it an excellent jet lag recovery tool.

Tip #3: Skip caffeine and alcohol during your flight

We recommend skipping caffeine and alcohol because they act as diuretics, pulling fluids from your tissues. Opt for some room-temperature or warm water while in flight. That way you can protect your skin and stay hydrated.

Tip #4: Walk or stretch every hour to activate the muscle pump

Depending on the length of your flight, you should attempt to walk or stretch every hour to help activate your muscles. This can help to move lymph and blood throughout your body. Of course, do this only when it is safe to do so. Typically a flight will indicate when it is safe to move around the plane.

Tip #5: Use a facial oil barrier + mist to prevent transepidermal water loss (TEWL) mid-flight

To combat the dry cabin air that strips your skin of moisture, layer a nourishing facial serum and follow with a hydrating mist. This duo acts as a protective barrier, reducing TEWL and helping maintain a healthy skin barrier while flying.

Try: Light-Activated Glow Serum

Light-Activated Glow Serum is formulated to plump, hydrate, and stimulate radiant skin. This innovative light-activated formula amplifies the benefits of the HIGHERDOSE Red Light Face Mask and Red Light Neck Enhancer. Used alone, the nourishing blend of bio-nutrients & hyper-clean ingredients, like hyaluronic acid, copper peptides, and bio-identical vegan collagen, is powerful on-the-go hydration.

Tip #6: Gently massage the jawline and collarbone area for facial lymphatic drainage

Massaging the jawline and collarbone area helps stimulate lymphatic drainage, which can reduce puffiness and facial swelling often caused by air pressure changes and dehydration during flights.

How To Recover Post-Flight

When you land, your body is craving circulation. Here's how to stimulate lymphatic drainage after flying and get your energy back on track:

Microcurrent Therapy for Lymphatic Drainage

Microcurrent therapy sends low-level electrical currents through the skin, stimulating the lymphatic system, fascia, and muscles. It mimics your body’s bioelectric signals to:

• Encourage lymph movement and reduce swelling

• Boost ATP production (aka cellular energy) for recovery

• Improve microcirculation for a fresh post-flight glow

• Helps tone and sculpt connective tissue, including fascia

Try: Microcurrent Body Sculptor
This is your ultimate post-travel lymphatic reset. Use this post-flight to move stagnant fluid, reduce swelling, and reconnect with your body. This can be especially helpful for your legs, abdomen, and arms.

Additional Recovery Tools Backed By Physiology:

• Dry brushing: Stimulates lymphatic vessels just beneath the skin to encourage detox.

• Cold water exposure: Activates the sympathetic nervous system to reduce inflammation, improve vagus nerve tone, and re-energize the body.

• Light movement (like rebounding, yoga or fascia rolling): Helps reoxygenate tissues, reduce muscular tension, and restore full-body circulation.

Your Jet-Set Wellness Toolkit: Travel Light, Land Glowing

Make travel wellness effortless with a curated ritual you can take anywhere. Pack these recovery-enhancing essentials to support your glow on the go:

• Highdration Powder for electrolyte-rich hydration

• Red Light Mask & Neck Enhancer for in-flight skin therapy

• Light-Activated Glow Serum to supercharge your skincare

• Microcurrent Body Sculptor for lymphatic recovery post-flight

• Supercharge Copper Body Brush for fascia and lymph support

• Transdermal Magnesium Spray to relax tense muscles and support sleep

• Compression socks to prevent leg swelling

• Sleep mask + calming playlist for circadian rhythm reset

Travel Smart, Glow Smarter

Travel doesn’t have to leave you depleted, and your wellness routine doesn’t have to stop at TSA. By understanding how your biology is impacted, and using science-backed tools and rituals that support hydration, fascia health, and lymphatic drainage, you can transform travel into a time of renewal and return feeling lighter, clearer, and radiant.

Wherever you're headed next, HigherDOSE helps you land glowing.