Titanium dioxide (oil-dispersible)
Opaque white. Wholesale Supplies Plus supplier or guide, Fisher, The Complete Photo Guide to Soap Making primary source
Opens the calculator’s starter recipe, 1000 g of oils, with this additive at the dose it fills in, ready to change.
What it is
Titanium dioxide is the white pigment soapmakers use to lighten soap. This grade is made to disperse in oil, and packs denser, about 0.95 g per mL, than the grades made for water.
Wholesale Supplies Plus supplier or guide, KRONOS primary source
How much
- 1 tsp per pound of soap filled in Wholesale Supplies Plus supplier or guide
- up to 1 tsp per pound of soap Nature’s Garden supplier or guide
The calculator fills in 1 tsp per pound of soap: 14.8 g for the 1000 g of oils in its starter recipe.
When and how
- Usually: at light trace.
- Mix it first with a little of the recipe’s oil, about a teaspoon of powder to a tablespoon of oil, so it spreads without specks.
Soap Queen supplier or guide
What it does to the recipe
- It changes neither the lye nor the water: it is only weight in the bar.
Worth knowing
- It makes glycerin rivers, the pale streaks in some bars, more visible. They show less when it is dispersed in oil than in water. Soap Queen supplier or guide
- Caution: Do not breathe the powder: wear a dust mask when you weigh it. EU law bars it from products whose use can reach the lungs. Regulation (EC) No 1223/2009 primary source
Spoons and drops
- 1 tsp ≈ 4.68 g
- 1 tbsp ≈ 14 g
- 1 cup ≈ 225 g
KRONOS primary source
INCI name
CI 77891 (Colour Index number)
- CAS number
- 13463-67-7
- EC number
- 236-675-5
- US colour additive name
- Titanium Dioxide
Recipes that use it
- Blue and gold drop swirl bar
- Charcoal pencil line bar
- Egg yolk feather swirl bar
- Five-layer blue ombre bar
- Green cube embed bar
- Indigo and annatto funnel pour bar
- Lemon, annatto and cocoa linear swirl bar
- Soap scrap confetti bar
- Taiwan swirl bar in charcoal and rose
- Three-colour hanger swirl bar
- White bar with a feathered mica top
- White tea faux funnel pour bar
Guides that discuss it
Sources
Wholesale Supplies Plus, soap colorants guide: titanium dioxide is "prized for its dense, white opacity", and "A single teaspoon is sufficient to lighten one pound of soap"; "half of this amount or even less for brown oxide and red oxide"; oxides "must be thoroughly mixed with oil before use"; micas offer "a spectrum of bright hues"; ultramarines have "potential to emit sulfurous odors".
David Fisher, The Complete Photo Guide to Soap Making (Creative Publishing International, 2018), p. 20: dyes "give a full range of hues—from subtle to bright and bold", but "can bleed between layers or swirls of soap, especially in melt-and-pour soap. Some are not stable in cold process soap, so test them first"; oxides "are very stable and strong in soap". Natural colours, pp. 82–84. In an infused oil: "Annatto: yellow-orange"; "Alkanet: light to deep purple, depending on the amount used"; "Paprika: orange-peach". In the lye solution: "Indigo: light to deep blue"; "Madder root: pinkish-red"; "Rose clay: deep rose pink". Added to the oils or at trace: "Activated charcoal: light gray to deep black"; "Black walnut hull (ground): speckled brown, also an exfoliant"; "Calendula flower petals (whole or ground): nice, warm yellow"; "Carrots (puréed or juiced): muted orange"; "Cinnamon: reddish tan to brown"; "Cocoa powder: tan to brown"; "Cucumber: pale yellow-green"; "Rosehips (ground): speckled reddish brown"; "Sage: muted green"; "Spirulina: pastel green/blue-green". For "a bright, white bar of soap": "Add titanium dioxide: about 1 teaspoon per 1 pound (454 g) of oils."
Soap Queen, glycerin rivers: "more visible with pigments, especially titanium dioxide"; disperse it in oil rather than water.
Nature’s Garden, titanium dioxide: "no more than 1 teaspoon per pound of soap".
Regulation (EC) No 1223/2009, Annex IV entries 143 and 144 and Annex III entry 321: titanium dioxide and zinc oxide "Not to be used in applications that may lead to exposure of the end-user’s lungs".
KRONOS, List of Grades (July 2026), p. 23: titanium dioxide bulk density 950 kg/m³ for the oil-dispersible grade, 500–600 kg/m³ for the water-dispersible grades.