Pigment lasers are sorted by wavelength and pulse, not by brand name
Two numbers decide what a pigment laser does: which wavelength the light is, and how long the pulse lasts. Melasma is the exception that stops any of them being ranked.
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A Korean clinic’s laser list reads as a list of names. Sorted by what the machines actually do, most pigment lasers reduce to two variables: which wavelength the light is, and how long the pulse lasts. Everything else on the brochure sits downstream of those two numbers.
Wavelength decides what absorbs the light
Light is absorbed by specific targets, and melanin, haemoglobin and water each absorb different wavelengths to different degrees. A device aimed at pigment is chosen because its wavelength is absorbed more by melanin than by the tissue around it. That is the whole principle, and it is why a machine that is excellent for one target can be irrelevant for another.
It is also why depth matters: longer wavelengths generally reach deeper, so a pigment sitting deep in the dermis and a pigment sitting at the surface are not the same problem and are not treated with the same setting.
Pulse duration decides what happens to it
The second number is time. A pulse measured in nanoseconds and a pulse measured in picoseconds deliver energy over very different intervals, and the shorter the interval, the more the effect tends toward mechanical disruption of the pigment particle rather than heating of the surrounding tissue. Less heat spread is the argument for the shorter pulse. It is an argument about collateral damage, not about power.
This is the part marketing flattens. “Pico” names a pulse duration. It does not name a result, and it does not make a device suitable for a condition it was never aimed at.
The condition that does not follow the rule
Melasma is the standing exception and the reason this page refuses to sort devices into better and worse. It responds unpredictably, it recurs, and heat can worsen it. A clinic that offers the same laser answer for freckles, for a dermal pigment and for melasma has answered three different questions with one machine.
What this means at consultation
The useful question is not which laser the clinic owns. It is what the doctor believes your pigment is, how deep it sits, and why the chosen wavelength and pulse suit that answer. A doctor who can say that can also tell you what the device will not fix.
This article is information, not medical advice, and reading it does not create a doctor-patient relationship. The Seoul Glow is a registered facilitator: we coordinate care, we do not practise medicine and we do not decide what treatment is right for you. No outcome can be guaranteed by anyone. Discuss any procedure with a licensed physician who has examined you.
