Compression Stockings, Leg Makeup, Spray Tans or Sclerotherapy? I Tried Every Way to Hide Spider Veins and Sun Spots, and Ranked Them From Worst to Best.

I've spent more money hiding my legs than I'd like to admit. I compared the cost, the effort, the mess, and what each one actually does to spots and veins. At the end, I'll tell you what I use on my own legs now.

By Gail Turner Verified

64, Tauranga · Reviewing beauty products for mature skin for 20+ years · 6-minute read

Short on time? See my #1 pick →

If you've ever stood in front of the wardrobe in December with a dress in one hand and a pair of pants in the other, you already know the options.

• Compression stockings.
• Leg makeup.
• Self-tanner from the chemist.
• A spray tan.
• And, if it's really getting to you, sclerotherapy.

Every one of them sounds reasonable when you're reading the packet or the clinic's website.

So which one should you actually choose?

I've tried all of them on my own legs over the last nine years. Spider veins behind both knees and around my ankles. A scattering of sun spots down my shins that seemed to arrive all at once in my late fifties.

Before I rank them, there's one thing you need to understand. Once you know it, this whole comparison gets much easier.

First: Why Every Tanner Made Your Spots and Veins Darker

If you've tried a self-tanner and your spider veins came out looking like bruises, you didn't do it wrong.

Almost every tanner on the chemist shelf runs on the same active ingredient: synthetic DHA. The expensive one, the cheap one, the mousse, the lotion, the one that says natural on the front. Different bottles. One chemical.

You haven't tried nine self-tanners. You've tried the same one nine times.

It doesn't sit on your skin like makeup. It reacts with the top layer to make colour, and the reaction isn't even-handed. It goes harder wherever there's already more colour, and harder again wherever the skin is thinner.

Which is exactly where a spider vein is. Exactly where a sun spot is. Exactly the backs of your knees.

And the reason it hits that hard is speed. Every bottle on the shelf competes on how fast it works. To pull colour out of skin in two hours, a formula has to go in hard, and going in hard is exactly what finds the veins and spots.

Keep one question in mind for the whole ranking:

Does this make my legs look even, veins and spots both, in time for this summer? Or does it just hide them, or make them worse?

I scored every option on five things:

• ➡ How it looks
• ➡ Cost
• ➡ What you have to go through
• ➡ The mess: clothes, sheets, car seats
• ➡ Whether it evens out spots and veins in time for this summer

Let's start at the bottom.

#6 — Compression Stockings

This is where a lot of us start, because a doctor or a friend suggested them.

And to be fair, they do something. They support your legs and they cover what's underneath.

But if what you actually want is "I want to wear a dress to the beach and not think about my legs", then there's an obvious problem. The stockings are the thing you're trying not to wear.

It's 28 degrees in January. You're at a barbecue in a summer dress and beige stockings. Everyone can see you've covered up, and the veins are still underneath when you peel them off at night.

They're not cheap either. A good pair can cost well over NZ$100, and they lose their stretch within months. Keep two pairs on the go and you're paying every year for something you have to wrestle on again tomorrow morning.

They have their place. For my goal, they're hiding, not fixing.

#5 — Leg Makeup

Leg makeup is the first thing that actually made my legs look even, and I want to give it credit. A good airbrush leg spray from the chemist covers spider veins and spots better than anything else on this list, for about twenty dollars.

For one evening.

Then it's on the hem of your dress. On the car seat. On your friend's white couch. And if you go anywhere near water, it's gone.

I wore it to my niece's wedding. I spent the whole reception sitting very still and not crossing my legs.

#4 — Express Self-Tan Mousse

This is the one most of us have under the sink.

It's quick. Colour in an hour or two. It smells like burnt biscuits, but it's quick.

And it's the one that made my veins look like bruises.

Remember the first section: fast means hard, and hard means the darker patches take more colour than the skin around them. On a 25-year-old with even skin, an express mousse looks great. On legs with spider veins and sun spots, it takes everything you were trying to hide and outlines it.

Then there's the guide colour, the brown that comes out of the nozzle so you can see where you've been, which ends up on your sheets.

#3 — Spray Tan

A spray tan looks fantastic on a 30-year-old. I'm not going to pretend otherwise.

But it's the same chemistry. Synthetic DHA, applied by someone else, in a booth. The darker patches still take more colour. It's just done faster, and you pay for it.

It's usually NZ$45 to NZ$65 a session, it lasts about a week, and you have to book it, stand there in paper knickers, then avoid water and sweat until it develops.

#2 — Sclerotherapy

This is the serious option, and it deserves to be taken seriously.

A trained clinician injects a solution into small veins so they close and fade over the following weeks. For the right veins, it genuinely works. It's the only thing on this list that actually removes the veins it treats.

So why isn't it #1?

Because of what it means for the goal I'm ranking on: even legs, spots and veins both, this summer.

It's usually several sessions, often weeks apart, and you pay for each one. For cosmetic veins, that usually comes out of your own pocket.

There's a recovery period. Bruising and marks around the treated veins are common for a while afterwards, and you're usually told to wear compression and keep the area out of the sun. That's not easy in a Kiwi December.

It treats the veins it treats. New ones can still appear later.

And it does nothing at all for sun spots.

One important note: if your veins are raised, swollen or sore, that's a conversation for your doctor, not a cosmetic, and sclerotherapy may be exactly the right answer for you.

This is where it clicked for me

• Stockings hide them.
• Makeup paints over them.
• Mousse and spray tans race over them, and racing is what makes them darker.
• Sclerotherapy removes some of them, eventually, and leaves the spots.

Different prices, different effort, and not one of them gets you into shorts this summer with legs that look even.

So I asked a different question.

What if the colour simply went on slowly enough that it didn't grab the darker patches at all?