Written by Jake Oakey on February 17, 2022

What are the different types of eye and face protection?

When looking to provide protection to our eyes and face, you are left with a lot of choice in terms of the products available to you. The challenging part is understanding what eye and face protection is correct for your risk/hazard.

Let’s breakdown the key groups of products, the suitable hazards they protect from and the safety standards that differentiate them.

Safety Spectacles:

This eye protection product is the most common out of the options, conforming to the standard of EN166 F. This means the spectacles are designed to withstand low energy impacts, ultraviolet and solar radiation.

Safety spectacles differ on the most part with the design and comfort features, a premium product would be more suitable if being wore for long periods of time.

An example of a premium safety spectacle is here:

Bolle Rush+ Smoke lens safety spectacle

Safety Goggles:

This form of eye protection is used for harsh environments providing excellent durability, offering the wearer protection against medium energy impacts. With the tight fitting nature of safety goggles these will protect you from impact, particles, liquid splash and gases.

Remember that some goggles offer ventilation, for risks such as liquid splash and gas protection, it is recommended that you wear goggles with no ventilation to further reduce your risk of injury.

Conforming to the EN 166 B safety goggles to this standard have been through tough testing procedures.

Some safety goggles are designed with specific tasks in mind such as the below Welders goggle.

Portwest PW60 Gas Welding Goggle Blue

Over-spectacle:

This innovative spectacle allows the user to wear their prescription glasses underneath the over spectacles, maintaining your vision while providing the essential impact protection of a traditional safety spectacle (EN166).

Over spectacles come with side shields to offer further protection unlike most traditional safety spectacles.

Safety glasses over glasses

Face Shields:

If you require more than just eye protection, face shields are a great choice offering excellent EN166 B rated impact protection and a relaxed fit for the wearer. Face shields give the user options for prescription glasses to be worn underneath while providing great comfort and a secure fit.

Protection against high energy impacts and liquid splashes. Making a face shield suitable when operating hand power tools for example.

Most commonly you will see that face shields are attached to a browguard this is to provide a secure fit with a ratchet on the back for adjustment.

Face shields have more recently been added to safety helmets for convenience, often when you require impact protection from a visor you are also required to have impact protection for your head.

An example of a face shield with browguard below:

Polycarbonate face shield

An example of a helmet mounted face shield below:

Delta plus onyx safety helmet

For more on eye protection and what safety standard your eye protection needs to be - check out our recent blog! HERE

Related Posts

OAKEYS Safety Ltd
Independently verified
4.89 store rating (237 reviews) | 4.85 product rating

Our Brands

3M
AWDis
BASE Protection Footwear
Beeswift
Bollé
Centurion Safety
Delta Plus Group
DUNLOP Protective Footwear
ELKA
FRUIT OF THE LOOM CLOTHING
Glovezilla
Honeywell
KASK
Kustom Kit
Leo Workwear
Lode Group
Moldex
MSA Safety
OAKLAND GROUP
Portwest
Predator Safety Gloves
PULSAR
QED
RESULT
Rock Fall Safety Footwear
Russell Clothing
Supertouch
Traff Tex - TPF Plastics
Traffi Glove
UVEX
Copyright © 2025 OAKEYS Safety Ltd
0330 175 7117
sales@oakeyssafety.co.uk
Registered in England and Wales no 14105295 | VAT registration number 411832526
Unit 2 – 4, Protection House, Albion Road, North Shield. Tyne & Wear, NE30 2RH
lockenvelopeusercartmenuchevron-down
Independently verified
237 reviews