Eco-friendly and good for your hair, learn how to make a non-soap shampoo bar, why to make one, and how to use it.
What is a Shampoo Bar?
A shampoo bar is a solid cleanser that is meant for cleaning the hair. Shampoo bars have been gaining popularity lately because they have no need for plastic packaging, allowing them to be a zero waste type cosmetic product.
Why Use a Shampoo Bar?
There are several benefits to choosing a shampoo bar over a liquid type shampoo.
Sustainability
Because they are a solid-type product, no plastic bottle is needed for storing shampoo bars. When you make them yourself, there is absolutely no need for any sort of packaging whatsoever. Choosing to use a shampoo bar means that you can help reduce waste and eliminate the need for single-use plastics.
Travel-Friendly
With new restrictions on traveling with liquids, shampoo bars are a great TSA friendly alternative for those who want to fly with cosmetics in their carry on luggage.
Can you use a shampoo bar on your body?
Because the surfactants used are nice and gentle and the pH is also skin-friendly, you can use the shampoo bar on your body too. That makes it especially travel-friendly because you really only need to pack one bar for all over cleansing.
Preservative phobia?
While I think you should use a preservative when making this, as a precaution, shampoo bars are really the only type of surfactant based shampoo that you could get away with making without a preservative.
Because it doesn’t have any water-based ingredients in it, it technically doesn’t need a preservative. On the other hand, because you are contaminating the outside with water constantly, it still is a good idea to use one to keep microbes from growing on the surface of your bar.
If you are completely set against using a preservative, though, this is the only type of product where I’d say you could give it a try. If you do go that route, I’d suggest being careful about drying the bar immediately between uses and storing in a very dry environment.
Soap-Based Shampoo Bars vs. Surfactant Based (SYNDET) Shampoo Bars
There are several types of shampoo bars that are available for selling or for making yourself.
Soap-Based shampoo bars
While considered the most “natural,” soap based shampoo bars aren’t the best choice for most of us because of their high pH. Soap based shampoo bars are just that, soaps made with lye and oils just like the other soaps that I have shown you how to make on the blog.
Often times, people try to make soap bars slightly less harsh for hair by slightly lowering pH. That is done in an effort to make them better for hair. The problem is that the pH of soap can only be lowered slightly or you end up ruining it. Soap’s high pH is also what makes it self-preserving, meaning that it doesn’t need a preservative.
While most people’s skin can easily recover from using soap with its high pH, our hair is much more delicate. Most of our hair (other than the part in the follicle) is dead. For that reason, it can’t as easily recover from harsh conditions as our skin can. While you can condition your hair and smooth out the outer portion (the cuticle), making it look shinier and healthier, prolonged use of soap will normally damage hair.
When using a soap-based shampoo bar, you are normally told to do a final rinse with vinegar. The high pH of soap lift up the cuticle of your hair, making it look dry and dull. Because vinegar is acidic, that is meant to help close the cuticle and make your hair look healthier and shinier again.
Why make/choose a surfactant based (SYNDET) shampoo bar?
A synthetic detergent shampoo bar may sound like it would be harsher on your hair, but that isn’t really the case.
Many of us have been told that soap is good and natural and that “detergents” (other non-soap surfactants) are harsh and bad for us.
That misconception probably stems from the fact that most shampoos for sale use sodium lauryl sulfate (SLS), a popular (yet harsher) anionic surfactant. SLS is often used because it cleans very well and is quite inexpensive, but it also can irritate skin and strip skin and hair of their natural oils. (Yes, it may be cleaning too well, in a sense.) Fortunately for us, there are many types of milder surfactants available. As the demand rises for more natural, safer alternatives, the variety of available surfactants is increasing.
The advantage of using these more natural surfactants is that the pH can be adjusted to better suit our hair and keep it looking healthy. Soap, at the lower pH’s that we’re aiming for in hair care products (between pH=4-6) just isn’t soap anymore. Trying to lower the pH of soap that much would break it down. It’s impossible to make a soap-based shampoo bar in the ideal pH range for our hair.
If you do choose to use a soap-based shampoo bar, remember that it is important to follow it up with an acidic rinse. That can be achieved by rinsing your hair with diluted apple cider vinegar, for example.
How to use a Shampoo bar
Shampoo bars are actually quite simple to use. Using one is just like using a bar of soap. In fact, you can begin the process by lathering up the shampoo bar in your hands just as if you were washing them. Once you’ve worked up a lather, you can then rub your foamy hands over your hair and scalp, rubbing it in to work up a lather.
The other possibility is to take the shampoo bar and rub it over your wet hair until you’ve worked up the desired amount of lather. The only inconvenience to that method is that you are more likely to cover your shampoo bar with stray hairs.
Where to Store a Shampoo Bar
Once you’ve finished lathering up with the shampoo bar, you should rinse it and store it in a place where it can fully dry. Make sure that you don’t store it in a puddle of water or your shampoo bar could easily disintegrate.
I normally stand my shampoo bar up so that it is resting on one of the smaller edges, this allows for the maximum amount of air circulation around it. (It’s also why I prefer making a rectangular bar to a round one like the ones made by Lush.)
If you do plan on storing in a travel tin, make sure that the bar has completely dried before you store your bar or it could melt into a mushy mess.
Watch How Easy it is to Make a Shampoo Bar
How to Make a Shampoo Bar?
Shampoo Bar
Materials
- 45 g SCI
- 20 g SLSA
- 18 g coco glucoside
- 8 g coco betaine
- 3 g shea butter
- 2 g BTMS (I used BTMS-25)
- 2 g b-panthenol
- 1 g preservative
- 1 g essential oils
- .5 g vitamin e
Instructions
- Weigh out the surfactants (the SCI, SLSA, coco glucoside, and coco betaine), the shea butter, and the BTMS in a double boiler insert, or in a bowl that can be heated over a pan of boiling water.
- Begin to slowly heat and melt the ingredients over a double boiler, stirring until the ingredients have fully melted.
- This mixture is very thick and difficult to work with, so it’s really impossible to let it cool before mixing in the other ingredients. You’ll want to remove the mixture from your heat source and add in the other ingredients, working quickly.
- Do your best to fully incorporate the preservative, vitamins, and essential oils. Immediately press the mixture into a bar mold. I use silicone molds meant for bars of soap.
- You can help smooth the top of your bar by placing a sheet of parchment or wax paper over the mixture in the mold. Carefully rub over the top of the bar to smooth it.
- Optionally test the pH of your shampoo bar by running some water over the finished bar and testing the lather with a pH test strip. Because this is a solid product, it’s impossible to otherwise test the pH.
We’re looking for the pH of the lather obtained using your shampoo bar in your water (with whatever preservative you chose to use, and whatever optional ingredients you may have added).
This will help us determine if it would be best to adjust the pH of our next batch. The pH can be lowered by adding a few drops of lactic acid. (It’s unlikely that you’d want to raise the pH, but that can be done with some NaOH carefully dissolved in water.) - Once your shampoo bar has cooled, you can remove it from the mold and allow it to dry further. Unlike homemade soap, this shampoo bar can be used immediately. If it’s too soft, though, you can let in harden up slightly by leaving it to dry for a few days. (This can occur in regions with high humidity.)
Customizing your homemade shampoo bar
This shampoo bar uses a mixture of liquid and solid surfactants. Depending on the humidity of your region, you may want to adjust the ratio of solid to liquid surfactants in order to obtain a harder or softer shampoo bar.
The solid surfactants
SCI is short for Sodium Cocoyl Isethionate. It’s the first of the solid surfactants used and is also sometimes called “baby foam” because it is a gentle surfactant, mild enough for use in baby products. It’s derived from coconuts. SCI can be tricky to work with, but worth it because it’s such a great surfactant that works well in both soft and hard water. It’s normally sold as a powder or fine granule.
SLSA is short for Sodium Lauryl Sulfoacetate. It’s an ECOCERT certified surfactant that gives off a lot of foam. Because it can be derived from both coconut and palm oils, it’s a good idea to look for providers that either derive it only from coconut oil, or use sustainably obtained palm oil.
The liquid surfactants
Coco glucoside is one of my favorite mild and natural surfactants. It’s a gentle non-ionic surfactant and I’ve used it already in several recipes, including my DIY micellar water and the liquid clarifying shampoo.
Coco betaine is another coconut oil-derived natural surfactant that is often combined with coco glucoside because they work together well to form a nice foam and together have better cleansing properties.
Conditioning agents
Even though the surfactants that I have chosen are mild, it’s still a good idea to add some emollients or other conditioning agents. In my bar, I’ve chosen to use shea butter and BTMS. BTMS-25 is the cationic emulsifier that I use in my favorite homemade conditioner. (Soon I’ll be showing you how to make a solid conditioner bar too!) While these are optional ingredients, I think it’s a good idea to use them to help protect your hair.
Vitamins
I chose to use both vitamin E and b-panthenol in my shampoo bar. Vitamin E is an antioxidant that when used at .5-1% of the recipe helps keep other oils from going rancid. B-panthenol is also known as provitamin B5, and it can act as a humectant, helping to attract moisture into our hair, as well as to help nourish it. While these are also optional ingredients, they are a very welcome addition to your shampoo bar. I use both of these vitamins in most of my homemade skin and hair care products.
Preservative
I’d suggest using a preservative in your shampoo bar because it will be used in a humid environment, and you’ll likely be getting it wet quite often. You’ll want to make sure the pH of your bar is in an effective range for whatever preservative you choose (and you’ll need to use it at the recommended percentage). I’ve been using Sharomix 705, an ECOCERT certified natural preservative which can be used at around 1% of the recipe by weight. For it to be effective, the product needs to have a pH below 5.5.
If you are dead set against using a preservative, do so at your own risk. You’ll need to be very careful about keeping the bar in a very dry environment and making sure you can dry it out fully as quickly as possible.
Camille Malterre
Hello,
I think you made a mistake because you wrote that SLS was a non-ionic surfactant, whereas it’s an anionic one.
Otherwise, thank you very much for this recipe and for all your blog, I’m learning a lot of stuff! I’m definitely gonna try this recipe out! 🙂
Tracy Ariza
Oh, my!
Yes, this is one of those instances where “your mind is thinking one thing and you are saying or writing another.” Sigh.
Thanks for catching that- and I just updated it! ❤️
Susan
Hi Tracy
Thanks for sharing this recipe. I can’t wait to try it out!
Do I understand correctly that you can’t actually adjust the ph of the first batch as when you test the ph the bar is already in its solid state so the ph test can only be used for your next batch? So the first batch will just be a try-out? I would like to use citric acid to adjust the ph but wonder if I could add it to my first batch straight away…Do you have any idea how much I would need to add?
Also can I add hydrolised protein to this bar?
Many thanks in advance.
Susan
Tracy Ariza
Hi Susan,
Well, yes, in a way it’s really difficult to test the pH while making this as it solidifies so quickly.
With the combination I used, I found it to be just about right for an ideal pH for hair. So, I didn’t really need to adjust.
If you were to change up the ingredients, though- and depending on the preservative you use, it may end up slightly different than mine. In that case, you may want to adjust your pH.
You could always take out a small amount of the melted mixture and lather it up and check the pH while the rest of the mixture is in the melting pot. Or, if you weren’t happy with the pH of a solid bar, you could remelt it. I’d wait to add the heat-sensitive ingredients until you know, more or less, the final pH first, though, keeping in mind that a preservative may change the pH slightly.
Katie
I thought I would quickly share my experience making this recipe. I used SCI “needles” instead of the powder or granules thinking that it would be safer to work with as there’s no risk of breathing it in. But unfortunately the needles didn’t break down and i was left with an alternately crunchy and soft shampoo bar. I’ll grind the rest of the SCI up so I can use it to create a new one, I just thought I would share in case anyone was thinking of doing the same thing!! I’m looking forward to making a new batch as this is the best recipe I’ve seen!
Tracy Ariza
Hi Katie,
Thanks for the tip. I’ve never used the other formats, but did read that it can be hard to work with when not in powder form.
Yes, it’s a good idea to wear a mask when working with it, just in case. 😉
CJ
I had the same problem! I accidentally bought it in beads and discovered they don’t melt. So I added a little water and they did indeed dissolve but then I ended up with a very soft bar. Next time I put them in the food processor to grind up and omg the dust! It just floats in the air, it was horrible! I had a scarf over my face but it didn’t seem to make any difference. But it did the job and I ended up with a decent bar.
I am, however, finding the recipe a bit too harsh for my hair and having some static issues. This is probably not helped by it being winter here, but I would like to find a way to make it gentler. I’m not sure if its just a matter of adding more BTMS. I notice the bought liquid shampoo I use, which is very gentle, has glycerin as the first ingredient after water.
Tracy Ariza
Hi CJ,
I’ll have to update this recipe with a note about that!
As for it being too harsh- it surprised me a bit as I’m used to not shampooing often and I was fine with it. Each person’s hair is different, though, of course!
I’m out for the rest of the day, but I’m going to see if I can look at the notes from my haircare class to see if I can give you the best answer I can. (I could guess, but I’d rather take a look and see if they gave us tips and tricks for that.) 😉
Interesting about the glycerin, too, as it usually feels sticky to people when used at high concentrations.
Tami
Hi, if I don’t have any B-panthenol, can I leave it out? Or substitute it with natural powder ( neem, matcha, clay , etc)? At what phase should I be adding the powder? Thank you
Tracy Ariza
Hi Tami,
Yes, you can leave it out. I have it always on hand because I think it’s great for both hair and skin products. You’ll see it in most of my recipes.
That said, it’s always an optional ingredient. You can just sub it out for more water.
You can try playing with other additives. With a shampoo bar, you don’t really have a lot of time to wait for the product to cool down before adding it in or it will get too hard to pour into the mold. So, just add in any additives at the last minute before pouring into the molds.
I’m not sure which ones will work and which may not incorporate well. You’ll have to experiment a bit.
Katie O'Brien
Can i substitute the coco betaine for more of the coco glucoside? Also, i am finding coco glucoside hard to find in the uk, could decyl glucoside be used instead?
Tracy Ariza, DDS
Hi Katie,
Yes, you should be able to make either of those changes. Subbing it with decyl glucoside will probably keep it more similar to my recipe, but, in the end, most people probably won’t be able to discern much of a difference anyway. The combinations of surfactants is done to have a variety of classes of surfactants and benefit from the properties of each class. (Some add lather, some stabilize the lather, some clean really well, some add mildness, etc.)
You can definitely give it a try.
Just make sure to sub out solid ones for other solid ones and liquid ones for liquid ones. Ideally, try to stay with the same class of surfactant. In this case, coco betaine is amphoteric and coco glucoside is non-ionic. In the end, they are both mild surfactants. The solid ones add a lot of lather in this recipe, so you probably wouldn’t notice much of a difference.
You may need to make adjustments for hardness of the bar, etc., with any changes, but that should be simple enough with a bit of experimentation.
Boricio
Great Article! Love the video and instructions on how to make this shampoo bar. I’m from the UK, and it is actually really hard to purchase all of these ingredients from 1 or 2 sources. Looks like I be ordering from at least 4 different retailers, which is outside of my realm of a Amazon customer 🙂
My main hurdle at the moment is the ingredient Coco betaine. I have read that Cocamidopropyl betaine is not the same Coco betaine. However I am unable to find Coco betaine here. My question is, can I substitute Coco betaine with Cocamidopropyl betaine?
Better still, does any one of you good people have a “go to” store to source all of these ingredients in the UK?
Tracy Ariza
Hi Boricio,
Thank you.
I actually buy most of my supplies here in Spain at a place called cremascaseras.es. I know that they do send to the rest of Europe and they also sell coco betaine, so you could look into them to see if shipping isn’t too bad. (I can normally get it free here in Spain if I buy enough or when they have certain free shipping days.)
Yes, you can sub it out. They are very similar. Coco betaine is just a bit more natural from what I understand, but they are otherwise almost the same.
You can also sub out some of the other ingredients to make it easier to source your ingredients.
Boricio
Awesome! Thanks Tracy for getting back top me! Another and hopefully the last from me…
I noticed that coco glucoside has a pH of 11. I am wondering how the final pH of the bar is at 5.5 as all the other ingredients doesn’t look like it will neutralise the high alkali? Or is it that the percentage used is not high enough to effect the overall bar?
Many Thanks
Tracy Ariza
Hi Boricio,
I didn’t have any problems with the pH of the bar overall and didn’t need to adjust mine down.
If you look up some of the others, you’ll notice that their pH is much lower.
SCI, for example, can have a pH from 4.5-6.5. As it will vary from supplier to supplier, it’s still a good idea to check the pH of your bar to see if it falls into a decent range.
I do that by making a lather with tap water (as that’s what I’ll be using when I shampoo my hair), and see what pH the foam has. That helps reproduce the pH range that our hair will be dealing with when you are using the bar.
You really have to sort of guess when adjusting down and measure how much acid you need to add (if any) to have a more precise measurement for your next batch.
Tabitha Norman
Sorry if this has been asked already but can cocoa butter be used instead of shea butter? I already purchased all of the ingredients for the conditioner bar and would like to have some overlap ? I can’t wait to try this out!
Tracy Ariza
Hi Tabitha,
Yes, you can sub out the butters. Keep in mind that cocoa butter is quite a bit harder than shea. In a shampoo bar, though, extra hardness isn’t really a problem. ?
(It may make a bigger difference in other recipes.)
Anette Pieler
Hi,
Thanks so much for this guide to shampoo bars! I’ve Looked at it for a long time, and yesterday I made the first one. The only difference being, that I used Lanette vax instead of BTMS (as I couldn’t get that here) and I used Caliumsorbat as s preservative. As said I made it yesterday and at room temperature its soft. Not quite playdoh, but I can press my finger into it and make an indent. Shouldn’t it be harder??
Tracy Ariza
Hi Anette,
Yes, it should be harder, but, that said, I suspect that it will harden as it dries out, so it should be fine.
The consistency can vary a lot on the humidity of where you live. You can adjust that by lowering the amount of liquid surfactant to get it right for your environment.
I don’t have experience working with Lanette or Caliumsorbat. That said, I sort of doubt that the difference in texture had anything to do with your changes (and not the environment) unless the preservative was used at a higher percentage AND it is a liquid. I guess the emulsifier could be on the softer side, but I’d be surprised if that made a huge difference. (It is possible, though.)
What I will say, though, is that I specifically chose BTMS because its a cationic emulsifier, the type that is conditioning to the hair. I’m not really sure that the Lanette is really doing anything that great for the product. (You may not even need it. I’m not sure if the coco glucoside would need an emulsifier to be worked into the bar because the surfactants themselves can have emulsifying properties. It really depends on the amount of liquid you are trying to add.)
I just wanted to point that out, though, because the feel that it gives your hair may change completely if you aren’t using a cationic emulsifier.
Phoebe Summers
Hi! Absolutely love this blog – and this recipe is fantastic.
I’ve been thinking about trying to customise this shampoo bar by adding scented essential oils, such as peppermint, nettle and cinnamon as I know them to be stimulating on the scalp.
Would you advise adding these around the same time as the vitamin E? Am happy to experiment !
All the best.
Tracy Ariza
Hi Phoebe,
Thank you so much! 🙂
Yes, I add them in the end with the vitamin E.
These harden up pretty quickly so you won’t need to wait for it to cool as you would with a lotion recipe. If you’re worried about them being affected by the heat, you can add them, miz thoroughly, quickly pour into molds, and then pop into the fridge or freezer. 😉
Iona
Hi Tracey,
Thanks for this recipe! I’m going to give this a go next week. I have an aloe vera plant and was hoping to use some fresh aloe gel in this recipe. Do you think this will work? Do you have any suggestions?
Thanks again!
Iona x
Tracy Ariza
Hi Iona,
Happy to help!
I wouldn’t personally add fresh gel to this. The gel would be water-based and this bar doesn’t have any other water-based ingredients. It would separate out.
Another thing to keep in mind is that fresh aloe gel is notoriously difficult to preserve. That’s why most cosmetic formulators buy already preserved aloe juices and gels and use those.
While fresh it is great for applying immediately, it’s very difficult to keep it from getting overridden with bacteria or other microbes if you try to store it for very long.
Iona
That’s really useful, thank you so much for such a swift response!
Elisa
Hi Tracy
Thank you for taking the time to make this great page! I would like to edit out the use of citric acid because it fades hair color like nobody’s business (I’m a colour specialist :-)) I think I gleaned from your earlier answers that you can use just SLSA, am I understanding you correctly? I cannot wait to try this out!
Hugs from Copenhagen
Tracy Ariza
Hi Elisa,
The citric acid is optional, and you would only use a very tiny amount. It’s only there to lower the pH, if needed. (If you change out ingredients, it’s very possible you’ll end up with a higher pH than I did.) Yes, you are correct- you definitely don’t want to use it directly on your hair, but here you are using it (optionally) mixed with the other ingredients in the tiniest amount, just enough to lower the pH into the correct range for your hair. That’s why it shouldn’t cause you any issues with fading your hair. If you were to use it straight, it’s very acidic and that would make a huge difference. 😉
While I haven’t tried the substitutions, yes, theoretically, you could use just one of the surfactants. Of course, doing that substitution may change the texture, the amount of lather, etc. They both should work, though.
Again, when you make substitutions, it’s a good idea to check the final pH of your new formulation by testing the pH of the formed lather.
While you can’t really adjust the pH well after the fact, you’ll want to keep it in mind for the next bar you make. You may want to add the tiniest amount of citric acid to get the pH just right. 😉
Nicole
Hi, I love your site and appreciate all of the information you give. If I start with an oatmeal pour and melt base (or shea butter pour and melt base) can I add coco glucoside and coco betaine to it and if so how do I know how much to add? I am starting with a 1 lb base.
Tracy Ariza
Hi Nicole,
Thank you!
I’m sorry,
I have no experience working with a melt and pour base. You’d have to compare the ingredients in it and do some experimentation.