Written by Elizabeth Mika
Founder and Maker, Bramble & Bear™ Soap Co.
What different oils and butters do in cold process soap
Read the labels on a few handmade soaps and you'll find very different oils—olive, coconut, shea, avocado, castor, even jojoba.
Why?
Because different oils make different soap. Some create big bubbles. Some help build a harder bar and creamy lather. Others help balance stronger-cleansing oils.
There isn't one “best” oil. The important part is how they work together.
What Different Oils Bring to Soap
The visual below compares common oils and butters used in cold process soap and their typical contributions to hardness, cleansing, big bubbles, creamy lather, other roles, and overall character.
What Different Oils Bring to Soap - Text Version
Coconut Oil — Primary role in bar hardness, cleansing character, and abundant bubbly lather.
Babassu Oil — Primary role in bar hardness, cleansing character, and abundant bubbly lather, with a formulation role similar to coconut oil.
Cocoa Butter — Primary role in bar hardness and structure, while contributing to a denser, creamier lather.
Mango Butter — Primary role in bar hardness and structure, while contributing to a denser, creamier lather.
Shea Butter — Supporting role in bar hardness and structure, with an important contribution to creamy lather.
Olive Oil — Primary role in balancing the overall fatty-acid profile and contributing to the character of the finished bar and lather. Naturally rich in oleic acid.
High-Oleic Sunflower Oil — Primary role in balancing the overall fatty-acid profile. Rich in oleic acid and commonly used as part of a balanced soap formula.
Avocado Oil — Supporting role in bar structure, creamy lather, and overall formula balance. Naturally rich in oleic acid.
Rice Bran Oil — Supporting role in bar structure, creamy lather, and overall formula balance.
Sweet Almond Oil — Primary role in balancing the overall fatty-acid profile. Naturally rich in oleic acid and commonly used as part of a balanced soap formula.
Castor Oil — Primary role in supporting and stabilizing lather.
Jojoba — Specialty formulation ingredient. Jojoba is primarily composed of liquid wax esters rather than conventional triglyceride oils.
Big Bubbles & Cleansing
Coconut and babassu oils are especially good at producing quick, abundant bubbles.
Much of this comes from lauric and myristic acids, fatty acids that contribute hardness, bubbly lather, and cleansing ability.
Because these oils have a distinct cleansing character, soapmakers commonly combine them with other oils to create a balanced finished bar.
Hardness & Creamy Lather
Shea, mango and cocoa butters play a different role.
They contain more palmitic and stearic acids, which help create structure and a denser, creamier style of lather.
This is why two soaps can both be hard yet behave very differently. A coconut-rich bar may be hard and highly bubbly, while a bar with more hard butters may produce a creamier lather.
Milder, Balancing Oils
Olive, high-oleic sunflower, avocado, rice bran and sweet almond oils fall on another side of the spectrum.
Many are rich in oleic acid and are commonly used to help balance the stronger-cleansing characteristics of oils such as coconut or babassu.
Olive oil is the classic example. It behaves very differently in soap from coconut oil, even though both begin as vegetable oils.
Neither is automatically better. They simply do different jobs.
Castor — The Lather Helper
Castor oil is unusual because it contains a large amount of ricinoleic acid.
Soapmakers value it particularly for helping support and stabilize lather, which is why it can play an important role even when it isn't one of the main oils in a formula.
Jojoba — The Oil That Isn't Quite an Oil
Jojoba is commonly called an oil, but chemically it is primarily a liquid wax ester.
That makes it different from olive, coconut or avocado oil. In soap, it is generally treated as a specialty ingredient rather than a main source of cleansing, hardness or bubbles.
The Chemistry in Four Lines
Lauric + Myristic → bubbles + cleansing
Palmitic + Stearic → hardness + creamy lather
Oleic → milder, balancing character
Ricinoleic → lather support
It's About Balance
A longer ingredient list doesn't automatically mean a better bar. One oil may bring bubbles, another hardness, another creamy lather, and another may help create balance within the formula
What matters is how those ingredients work together in the finished soap.
Explore Bramble & Bear Cold Process Soap
Discover our collection of handmade cold process soap, thoughtfully formulated with oils, butters, and other ingredients chosen to work together in the finished bar.
Shop Handmade Soap →
Next in the series:
Cold Process Soap — Part 2: Additives →
Sources
SoapCalc — Soap Qualities Chart; Soap Making Oil Chart & Properties.
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