Laundry Detergents for Sensitive Skin: What to Look For
Your clothes touch your skin all day, so detergent matters. Here's how to choose a laundry detergent that's kinder to sensitive and eczema-prone skin.
The overlooked trigger
People overhaul their skincare and forget that clothes, towels and bedding sit against their skin for hours. Detergent residue, especially fragrance, is a genuine and common irritant.
What to look for
- Fragrance-free and dye-free.
- Non-bio is often gentler for very sensitive skin (it omits some enzymes), though evidence is mixed; fragrance is usually the bigger factor.
- Skip fabric softener and scented “beads”, which deposit fragrance onto fabric.
- An extra rinse cycle helps remove residue.
What to avoid
Strongly perfumed detergents, scent boosters, and fragranced fabric conditioners.
Check it against your triggers
To check a product, a free browser extension like Clearya flags ingredients of concern automatically as you shop online. That tells you what is in a product, but it rates it on general criteria rather than against your own list.
Once you know what you are screening for, a personal-list app like ClearaScan lets you save the ingredients you react to once and scan any product to flag only your triggers. It also keeps a Reaction Journal for flare-ups, a shared Care Circle so family or carers can scan for you, and a Trusted Products list for items you have cleared, and it is currently in early access. (Disclosure: our editor co-founded ClearaScan, and we are not paid to mention the others.)