Sulconazole: uses, dosing, side effects & brands
Sulconazole is an azole antifungal sold in the U.S. under one brand, for cutaneous candidiasis, tinea pedis and tinea versicolor. Below: what the FDA label says, every product that contains it, what the pills look like, and its recall record.
Key facts
- Drug class
- Azole Antifungal
- Treats (across its forms)
- Cutaneous Candidiasis, Tinea Pedis and Tinea Versicolor
- Available as
- Solution · Topical
- Sold as
- Exelderm
- Prescription?
- Prescription only
- Generic available?
- Not in our catalog
How sulconazole is dosed
From the FDA label for Exelderm (application NDA018737). Other sulconazole products — different forms, different strengths — are dosed differently. Follow the label for the one you were prescribed.
A small amount of cream should be gently massaged into the affected and surrounding skin areas once or twice daily, except in tinea pedis, where administration should be twice daily. Early relief of symptoms is experienced by the majority of patients and clinical improvement may be seen fairly soon after treatment is begun; however, tinea corporis/cruris and tinea versicolor should be treated for 3 weeks and tinea pedis for 4 weeks to reduce the possibility of recurrence. If significant clinical improvement is not seen after 4 to 6 weeks of treatment, an alternate diagnosis should be considered.
Sulconazole side effects
There were no systemic effects and only infrequent cutaneous adverse reactions in 1185 patients treated with sulconazole nitrate cream in controlled clinical trials. Approximately 3% of these patients reported itching, 3% burning or stinging, and 1% redness. These complaints did not usually interfere with treatment.
Who shouldn’t take sulconazole
EXELDERM (sulconazole nitrate, USP) CREAM, 1.0% is contraindicated in patients who have a history of hypersensitivity to any of its ingredients.
Every sulconazole product we track (1)
Same active ingredient — different manufacturer, form, price and FDA recall record. That last one is what our independent score measures.
Only one: Exelderm.
Sulconazole and breastfeeding
From LactMed, the US National Library of Medicine’s Drugs and Lactation Database — quoted, not rewritten.
Full LactMed record for sulconazole: levels in milk, effects in breastfed infants, and the drugs it would consider insteadTopical sulconazole has not been studied during breastfeeding. About 11% of a dose is absorbed after topical application. It is considered a low risk to the nursing infant; however, other antifungal agents with less absorption may be preferred, especially while nursing a newborn or preterm infant. Avoid application to the nipple area and ensure that the infant's skin does not come into direct contact with the areas of skin that have been treated. Only water-miscible cream or gel products should be applied to the breast because ointments may expose the infant to high levels of mineral paraffins via licking.
National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, record revised November 15, 2024. LactMed states its information is not a substitute for professional judgement.
What people report to the FDA about sulconazole
The FDA Adverse Event Reporting System (FAERS) collects reports from patients and clinicians. It holds 9 reports naming sulconazole, and the FDA flagged 78% of those reports as serious. The effects reported most often — leaving out reports about overdose, misuse or the condition being treated, which dominate the raw list for common medicines:
- fall2 reports
- nausea2 reports
- adverse drug reaction1 reports
- bone disorder1 reports
- cataract1 reports
- cellulitis1 reports
- craniofacial fracture1 reports
- dermatitis atopic1 reports
Read these as a signal, not a rate. A report does not mean sulconazole caused the effect — anyone can file one, and many describe people taking several medicines for several conditions. Crucially there is no denominator: FAERS does not record how many people took the drug, so these counts cannot be turned into “X% of patients” — a bigger number often just means a more widely used or more talked-about drug. Duplicates exist, and publicity drives reporting. For what is actually established, read the FDA label section above.
Source: openFDA drug/event (FAERS), retrieved July 26, 2026.
Related calculators
Frequently asked questions
What is sulconazole?
Exelderm (Sulconazole Nitrate) is an azole antifungal used to treat Cutaneous Candidiasis, Tinea Pedis, Tinea Versicolor.
What kind of drug is sulconazole?
The FDA classifies sulconazole as an azole antifungal. Azole antifungals block a fungal enzyme (lanosterol 14-alpha-demethylase) that the fungus needs to make ergosterol, a key building block of its cell membrane. Without enough ergosterol the membrane becomes leaky and unstable, which stops the fungus from growing and can cause it to break apart and die. If you are checking whether it is safe to combine with something else, the class is what matters — two drugs from the same class usually should not be stacked.
Can you take sulconazole with other medicines?
It depends on the medicine. We check it against the FDA labels rather than guessing: our interaction checker searches each drug's own label for the other and quotes what it says, naming the section it came from. Run sulconazole against whatever else you take — and remember that a label not naming a drug is not the same as that combination being safe.
What forms does sulconazole come in?
Across the brands we track, sulconazole is currently marketed as solution and topical, per the FDA's National Drug Code Directory. Each form is dosed differently — follow the label for the exact product you were prescribed.
Is there a generic sulconazole?
We do not currently list a generic-labelled sulconazole product. That does not always mean none exists — it means none appears under a generic name in the FDA data we track. Ask your pharmacist.
Cite this page
- APA
- pharmaranks. (2026, July 24). Sulconazole: uses, dosing, side effects & brands. https://pharmaranks.com/drugs/sulconazole
- MLA
- “Sulconazole: uses, dosing, side effects & brands.” pharmaranks, 24 July 2026, https://pharmaranks.com/drugs/sulconazole.
We summarise public FDA and NIH sources — for a clinical claim, cite the primary source we link to as well.
Sources: FDA openFDA drug label, National Drug Code Directory, and Enforcement (recall) database. This page reproduces public FDA data and is not medical advice. Dosing is set by your prescriber.
Read the full FDA label for sulconazole on DailyMed (NIH) ↗.