Korean Pore Minimizer: Home Microneedling vs Clinic Potenza

I'm Dr. Jong Hoon Lee, a director at Gangnam HERA in Seoul. I'm a board member of the Korean Society of Aesthetic Surgery and of the International Petit Medical Society, and a co-author of LIFTINGOLOGY: Science and Clinical Practice in Aesthetic Medicine. Pores come up in my consultations constantly. Many women tell me their pores don't hide even with makeup on, or that their skin looks like orange peel. So in this video I took the comparison literally: I used a real orange and food dye to show how far different devices go.

My short answer: home pore care is better than nothing, but it is built to be safe rather than strong. Clinic microneedling reaches deeper, and Potenza adds radiofrequency energy and pressure on top of depth — which is why its effect on pores is stronger.

Why do pores stay visible even with makeup?

Because enlarged pores are a structural issue in the skin, not just a surface one, so covering the surface only goes so far. The patients who search for a "pore minimizer" usually describe the same thing: foundation settles into the pores, the skin on the cheeks looks textured like citrus peel, and products that promise to shrink pores change things only for a few hours.

To change how pores look over the long term, the skin around them needs to be stimulated to remodel — to rebuild a firmer, smoother structure. The question is how deep that stimulation reaches and how strong it is. That is exactly what I wanted to show on camera.

Is home pore care worth it?

Doing something is better than doing nothing, so yes, home care helps a little. But home devices are designed around safety first, so their effect is inevitably weaker than clinic equipment. That is not a criticism of home devices. A product that anyone can use at home, without a doctor, has to keep its needles short and its energy low. The same limits that make it safe also limit how much it can do.

In the video I compared four situations:

1. Dye applied with no device at all.
2. A home microneedling (MTS) device with needles of about 0.25 mm.
3. A clinic MTS device, which can be adjusted to the depth we want. We most commonly use about 0.75–1.0 mm on the face; I used 1.0 mm.
4. Potenza, the RF microneedling device we use most often for pore care, with a pumping tip at about 1.25 mm.

What did the orange test show?

Each step went deeper than the last: the home device clearly beat dye alone, the clinic MTS clearly beat the home device, and Potenza with its pumping tip stood out again. Here is what happened at each stage.

Dye only, and the home device

First I simply painted food dye on the orange and waited. Then I used the home device at about 0.25 mm before applying the dye. You could already feel the difference as the dye went on — it was taken up differently from the untreated surface.

Clinic MTS at 1.0 mm

The clinic device moves the needles straight up and down at a very high frequency. Even passing it lightly over the orange, juice came out of the peel. From the outside, though, it did not look dramatically different from the home device — which is why I cut the orange open at the end.

Potenza with a pumping tip

For real pore treatment we apply a good ampoule to the skin first. The pumping tip applies pressure — you can see a spring-like structure in the tip — so that the ampoule is driven deeper into the skin. Before that, the needles go in and out. And unlike the other devices, Potenza's needles release radiofrequency energy at the tips once they are inside. On the face we often use about 1.25 mm, though it varies by area.

The cross-sections

When I cut each section of the orange, the difference between home MTS and clinic MTS was clear. The difference between clinic MTS and Potenza — where pressure pushes the ampoule in — was also noticeable.

Does deeper always mean better for pores?

No. The orange test only shows how deep each method reaches; it does not show the full effect, and deeper is not automatically right for every area. I want to be clear about this, because a demonstration on fruit is not a clinical result on skin.

What makes Potenza more effective is not depth alone. Inside the skin it delivers physical, mechanical and electrical stimulation together — the needle itself, the pressure, and the radiofrequency energy. When those effects are combined, the remodeling response inside the skin is naturally stronger. At the same time, the right depth changes from one part of the face to another, and from one person's skin to another's. That is why the setting is chosen per area, not copied from a chart. If you want to understand the device in more detail, what Potenza RF microneedling can and cannot do covers it.

What does a pore treatment at HERA involve?

A look at your skin first, then a device and depth chosen for each area, with an ampoule or booster when it fits. In practice:

• Assessment. Enlarged pores, acne scars and general texture problems often look alike in photos but need different plans.
• Numbing. A topical numbing cream is applied first; most patients feel warmth or a light pricking during RF microneedling.
• Device and depth per area. For example, a deeper setting where the skin is thicker and a gentler one where it is thin.
• What goes in with it. At HERA, Potenza is often paired with an exosome booster, which the micro-channels help carry deeper. For pores that come with scarring or uneven texture, a collagen-stimulating booster such as Juvelook may be part of the plan.

If you are wondering whether to combine microneedling with a skin booster, I'd read the safety questions around skin boosters with microneedling and why microneedling and exosomes are combined first. You can also see how one patient's large pores and acne scars responded in this Juvelook pores and scars review.

What about recovery if I'm flying home?

With RF microneedling, mild redness, warmth or slight swelling usually settles within a day or two, so most visitors carry on with their trip. Protect your skin from the sun afterwards and keep your skincare simple for the first days. Pore improvement builds gradually as collagen remodels, so the change you notice in the mirror usually continues after you are home, and a series of sessions is often suggested for stubborn pores.

The honest limits

No treatment makes pores disappear, and results vary from person to person. Pores are part of normal skin. Treatment can make them look smaller and the surface smoother, but genetics, oil production and age still play a role, and maintenance matters. Redness, swelling and, rarely, inflammation can occur after microneedling. If your skin is currently inflamed or very sensitive, I may suggest calming it first before any needling.

So if you have been searching for the best Korean pore minimizer, my honest view is this: home care is a good habit, but for pores that stay visible even under makeup, it is worth coming in to have the cause checked and treated properly. You can see real HERA results in our before-and-after gallery.