A hickey is a bruise, and like any bruise, it fades on its own within a few days to two weeks. But if you need it gone faster, a combination of cold therapy, warmth, and gentle skin care can shorten that timeline. Most hickeys are superficial enough that they heal on the earlier end of the spectrum compared to deeper bruises like a black eye.
Why Hickeys Form
When someone sucks or bites your skin with enough pressure, tiny blood vessels just below the surface burst open. Each ruptured vessel releases a small spot of blood called a petechia. Dozens of these tiny spots pool together into a larger dark patch, creating the visible mark. The color you see is essentially trapped blood sitting in the surrounding tissue, and your body needs time to break it down and reabsorb it.
Act Fast With Cold in the First 48 Hours
The single most effective thing you can do early on is apply cold. Wrap an ice pack or a bag of frozen peas in a thin towel and press it against the hickey for 20 minutes at a time. Repeat this several times throughout the day for the first day or two. Cold narrows the damaged blood vessels, slowing additional blood from leaking into the tissue. The less blood that pools, the smaller and lighter the bruise ends up being.
Don’t press ice directly against bare skin. A thin cloth barrier prevents frostbite while still letting the cold do its job. If you don’t have an ice pack handy, a chilled spoon from the freezer works as a quick substitute for small hickeys.
Switch to Warmth After Two Days
Once the initial 48 hours have passed, heat becomes your ally. A warm compress or washcloth soaked in warm water and held against the area for 10 to 15 minutes helps increase blood flow to the site. That extra circulation encourages your body’s natural cleanup process, breaking down the trapped blood cells and carrying them away faster. You can repeat this a few times a day.
The logic is simple: cold limits the damage in the early stage, warmth speeds up the repair in the later stage. Using heat too early can actually make things worse by increasing blood flow to vessels that are still leaking.
Topical Treatments That May Help
A few over-the-counter products can support the healing process, though none will make a hickey vanish overnight.
- Vitamin K cream: Vitamin K plays a direct role in blood clotting and tissue repair. Creams containing vitamin K (typically around 1% to 5% concentration) applied twice a day may help the body reabsorb pooled blood faster. Some formulations combine vitamin K with retinol, which can further support skin recovery.
- Arnica gel: Arnica is a plant extract commonly sold as a bruise treatment. It’s available at most pharmacies and is applied directly to the skin. Evidence on its effectiveness is mixed, but many people find it helps reduce discoloration.
- Aloe vera: While it won’t speed up blood reabsorption specifically, aloe vera soothes irritated skin and supports general healing if the area feels tender or slightly inflamed.
Apply any of these gently. Rubbing too hard on a fresh hickey can irritate the already damaged tissue and potentially make the mark look worse.
Gentle Massage After the First Day
Light massage around the edges of a hickey can help disperse the pooled blood and encourage circulation. Using your fingertips, apply gentle pressure and work outward from the center of the mark. This won’t erase it, but it can help blur the edges and promote faster fading.
You may have heard that rubbing the area with a toothbrush or coin helps break up the bruise. The idea is that the bristles or edge stimulate blood flow to the surface. In practice, pressing too hard with a stiff object risks further irritating the skin, leaving you with redness or even light scratches on top of the bruise. If you try this approach, use a soft-bristled toothbrush with very light pressure, and only after the first 48 hours have passed.
Covering a Hickey While It Heals
Sometimes the best solution is concealment while you wait for biology to do its work. A color-correcting concealer in green or yellow tones neutralizes the red and purple tones of a fresh bruise. Apply the corrector first, then layer a concealer that matches your skin tone on top, and set it with a translucent powder so it stays put throughout the day.
Turtlenecks, scarves, collared shirts, and strategically placed hair all do the job without any product. If the hickey is on your neck and you need a quick fix for a meeting or event, a small adhesive bandage with a believable cover story works in a pinch.
How Long Hickeys Take to Fade
Most hickeys last anywhere from three days to two weeks, with the majority clearing up within a week. Because the trauma that creates a hickey is relatively shallow compared to a deep muscle bruise, your body can process and reabsorb the trapped blood more quickly.
As the hickey heals, you’ll notice it change color. It typically starts as a red or dark purple mark, then shifts toward blue or deeper purple over the next couple of days. As your body breaks down the hemoglobin in the trapped blood, the bruise transitions to green, then yellowish-brown, before finally fading to match your normal skin tone. People with lighter skin tend to notice these color stages more distinctly, while on darker skin tones the hickey may appear darker brown or purple throughout its lifecycle.
Factors that affect healing time include the severity of the suction, your overall circulation, and how quickly your body processes bruises in general. If you bruise easily in everyday life, hickeys will likely stick around a bit longer too. Staying hydrated, eating foods rich in vitamin C and iron, and getting enough sleep all support the body’s general repair processes.