Bioré UV Aqua Rich Watery Essence in Canada: DIN status

What Health Canada’s databases show

We searched Health Canada’s Drug Product Database on October 10, 2026 for “Aqua Rich”, “Bioré”, “Biore” and “Watery Essence”. Kao Canada holds these Aqua Rich sunscreen DINs:

Product	DIN	Status on Oct 10, 2026
UV Aqua Rich Weightless Moisturizer	02538547	Marketed since Jan 1, 2024
UV Aqua Rich Weightless Moisturizer, bilingual label	02538571	Marketed since Jan 8, 2024
UV Aqua Rich Glowy Moisturizer	02555158	Marketed since Jul 3, 2025
UV Aqua Rich Refreshing Facial Mist	02571633	Approved Sep 16, 2026, not yet marketed

None of them is the Watery Essence, and the natural-product licence database had no Bioré sunscreen either.

You can repeat the check in the Drug Product Database yourself.

Canada vs Japan: the sun filters

The database lists the active ingredients approved for each DIN. All three Canadian Aqua Rich products use the same four: avobenzone (3%), homosalate (7% in the Weightless Moisturizer, 10% in the other two), octisalate (5%) and octocrylene (5%).

Kao’s Japanese page for the Watery Essence lists four different sun filters: ethylhexyl methoxycinnamate (octinoxate, 2nd), ethylhexyl triazone (6th), diethylamino hydroxybenzoyl hexyl benzoate (DHHB, 9th) and bis-ethylhexyloxyphenol methoxyphenyl triazine (bemotrizinol, 10th). None of the four overlaps with the Canadian list.

So a Canadian Aqua Rich bottle and a Japanese one share a name, not a filter system.

What’s in the Japanese essence

Kao’s Japanese product page lists 33 ingredients for the 70 g tube (JAN 4901301447647), as we read it on October 10, 2026. The page is in Japanese, so the names here are our translation into standard INCI names. Alcohol is 3rd and fragrance is last.

Kao’s site also lists an older 70 g formula under the same name (JAN 4901301413246). Its list puts alcohol 2nd and adds royal jelly extract, so check which one you have.

For how to read the order, see how to read a Korean ingredient list; Japanese lists follow the same descending-order idea.

What stands out in our data

These notes come from Health Canada’s database and Kao’s own pages. We haven’t tested either version, and we don’t rate SPF claims.

• The brand itself holds the Canadian numbers. The DIN holder is Kao Canada. For the other two sunscreens we track, we found nothing for Beauty of Joseon, and Isntree’s only licences (for a different product) are held by importers.
• The Canadian versions carry more homosalate than anything else. It’s 7% or 10% of the formula, the largest active in each.
• The Japanese essence lists alcohol 3rd. If alcohol bothers your skin, the Japanese and Canadian versions may feel different; the DIN record doesn’t list inactive ingredients, so we can’t compare those.

Keep going

Our list of Health Canada-approved Korean sunscreens has the Bioré DINs alongside the Korean ones.

For the rules behind all this, read is Korean sunscreen legal in Canada.

Everything else we track from the brand is on the Bioré page.

Every sunscreen page we’ve written is on the sunscreen topic page.