Substitutes for soap

Sweet almond oil substitutes in soap

Sweet almond oil is a soft, oleic oil used as a minor share, and several oils take its place without moving hardness, conditioning or lather by more than a point: hazelnut, high-oleic sunflower and apricot kernel oil come closest. Hazelnut and high-oleic sunflower oil also keep better: with them the bar below carries 8.6 % and 8.1 % linoleic and linolenic acid, against 11.2 %. Hazelnut and apricot kernel oil barely move the lye; high-oleic sunflower takes a little less.

The bar they are tried in

Sweet almond oil20 %
Olive oil35 %
Coconut oil25 %
Shea butter20 %

NaOH · 1000 g · Superfat 5 % 139.7 g

The bar: 20 % sweet almond oil, at a 5 % superfat, for 1,000 g of oils. The rest: 35 % olive oil, 25 % coconut oil, and 20 % shea butter. As it is, it needs 139.7 g of sodium hydroxide.

Open the bar in the lye calculator

The substitutes, closest first

Substitute	Sodium hydroxide, g	With the lye left as it was
1Hazelnut oil	139.4	4.8 %barely moves
2High-oleic sunflower oil	138.7	4.4 %recalculate
3Apricot kernel oil	139.0	4.5 %barely moves
4Nothing in its place: olive oil takes its share	139.0	4.5 %barely moves
5Avocado oil	138.4	4.2 %recalculate
6Rice bran oil	138.9	4.5 %recalculate
7Macadamia oil	139.7	5.0 %barely moves

With the lye left as it was: the superfat when the sodium hydroxide weighed for the bar as it is goes in with the substitute, planned at 5 %. Each lye figure opens that bar in the lye calculator, which works out the lye for it.

Side by side: Sweet almond oil vs apricot kernel oil

What each does to the bar

	Hardness	Cleansing	Conditioning	Bubbly lather	Creamy lather	Iodine value	INS	Linoleic and linolenic acid, %
As it is, with sweet almond oil	36	17	61	17	19	62	145	11.2
Hazelnut oil	37	17	60	17	19	60	146	8.6
High-oleic sunflower oil	36	17	60	17	19	59	146	8.1
Apricot kernel oil	37	17	60	17	20	63	143	11.9
Nothing in its place: olive oil takes its share	38	17	58	17	21	59	146	8.8
Avocado oil	38	17	57	17	21	59	145	9.4
Rice bran oil	39	17	57	17	22	63	142	12.8
Macadamia oil	37	17	55	17	20	58	148	6.8
Usual range	29–54	12–22	44–69	14–46	16–48	41–70	136–165

Closest means the smallest total change across these figures, each counted against the width of its usual range, as the lye calculator’s swap suggestions count it. It is a convention, not a verdict on the bar: a butter that matches on paper can still melt lower, crack or smell, which the note above and the guides cover.

Guides

The soaping oils: what each one brings to a bar

Substitutes for other oils

Where these numbers come from

Every figure here is worked out from the oil records, each with its sources on its own page: