Household Ingredients Compared  ›  Hand Soap and Body Wash (Singapore)

Hand soap and body wash: what's actually in it?

Format note: hand soap and body wash are not food, so there is no nutrition section on this page — nutrition does not apply, and no nutrition numbers are invented, estimated or borrowed. Each panel below quotes the verbatim ingredient list as printed, with its source strength flagged. Where a list could not be verified, the product is in "seen but not verified", never panelled on a guess.

This page does not give a health score, a ranking or a "best" pick, and it does not show prices (they change weekly). It does not make efficacy or safety claims beyond what the label states — it describes ingredients as printed.

The headline, in 30 seconds

• Two corrections to the first pass, stated plainly. (1) The first pass's note that all Lifebuoy body washes contain Triclocarban as printed is overturned: only Lifebuoy Moisture Plus is verified with Triclocarban (Guardian Malaysia list); the Mild Care / Care with Milk list (EWG, "ingredients from packaging") contains no Triclocarban, and the Antibacterial/Total 10 list uses Silver Oxide instead. Cool Fresh's current marketing is "Active Silver", suggesting reformulation away from Triclocarban. (2) Dettol "Sakura Blossom" body wash does not exist on Dettol SG's own body-wash index — Dettol SG lists only Cool, Fresh, Lasting Fresh, Original, Skincare and Onzen variants. Do not panel a Sakura Blossom Dettol body wash for Singapore.
• Why this page is thinner than the first pass claimed: the first pass recorded 29 products with FairPrice SG ingredient-section lists, but FairPrice product pages are not indexed by search and this site's research pass had no live browser to re-open them, so those lists could not be re-verified and are not reproduced here as verified. What is panelled below is what could be verified from other sources in the re-verification pass, each with its source strength flagged. A live-browser FairPrice pass or pack photos are still needed for the rest.
• SLES + cocamidopropyl betaine is the near-universal base across the lists here; soap-based fatty-acid/KOH washes (Lifebuoy Moisture Plus) are the exception. Antibacterial actives as printed: Chloroxylenol (Dettol), Triclocarban (Lifebuoy Moisture Plus only, as printed in MY), Silver Oxide (Lifebuoy Antibacterial/Total 10), o-Cymen-5-ol (Kirei Kirei, Shokubutsu — not verified here, see below), Salicylic Acid (Dettol).
• Fragrance-free verified only for Suu Balm and QV Dermcare in this pass. GOAT and QV Dermcare are the only SLS/SLES-free washes verified here.
• Same name, different formula is the norm here — Lux Magical Spell has two different lists under the same name (14 vs 33 ingredients), Cetaphil Gentle Skin Cleanser has an old SG 8-ingredient SLS/paraben list vs a current 10-ingredient list, and Dettol Skincare has an SLS-based list vs a soap-free PEG-8 list. A non-SG list must never be presented as the SG pack.

At a glance — panelled products

Panelled with a full verbatim list: 6 products. Seen-but-not-verified: see list below. Sources: Raffles Health SG (QV Dermcare), CARiNG Pharmacy MY + INCIdecoder (Suu Balm), INCIdecoder + SkinSignal (Dettol), Guardian Malaysia (Lifebuoy Moisture Plus), SkinSort (GOAT) — checked 5–6 November 2026.

Seen but not verified — do not panel until checked

• Kirei Kirei — all 5 (Nourishing Berries, Natural Citrus, Moisturizing Peach, Refreshing Grape bundles — body wash only — plus standalone Anti-bacterial Hand Soap Peach): no SG bundle list found. EWG's "My Kirei" Yuzu lists (Foam Hand Wash Yuzu Flower; Nourishing Hand Wash Yuzu & Rice Water) are different scents/lines and were not used.
• Shokubutsu Men Recharge / Refresh; Radiance Firm & Whitening: no full list found for any variant (only unrelated Shokubutsu facial foam / shower oil entries).
• Felce Azzurra Sakura Flower; White Musk: no full list found (only Cool Blue and Menta Acquatica variants on INCIdecoder).
• Palmer's Coconut Oil Lime (body wash): no body-wash list found; only the Coconut Oil lotion and unrelated items.
• GOAT Coconut Oil; Oatmeal; Argan Oil: no lists found (only Manuka Honey, panelled above).
• Lifebuoy Mild Care / Gentle Skincare (incl. refills) and Cool Fresh: no verified SG list. The EWG "Care Family Body Wash Care with Milk" list (non-SG, "ingredients from packaging") contains no Triclocarban — which corrects the first pass's "all Lifebuoy with Triclocarban" note — but that list's final item ("DRIED CREAM") looks truncated, so it is provisional, not panelled. Cool Fresh's current marketing is "Active Silver", suggesting reformulation away from Triclocarban. Pack check needed for both.
• Lifebuoy Antibacterial Body Wash (Total 10 type): INCIdecoder list exists (antibacterial agent Silver Oxide, not Triclocarban) but is a non-SG secondary list with no SG-pack confirmation — not panelled; see research notes.
• Dettol Body Wash Skincare: conflict between two secondary sources (What's In My Jar: SLS-based 22-ingredient list; Truemeds India: soap-free PEG-8 list). Dettol SG confirms Skincare is sold in SG but prints no ingredients. Pack check required.
• Dettol Foaming Hand Wash Rose & Cherry: not verified as a foaming SG product. The full list found is for Dettol Liquid Hand Wash Rose & Cherry (EU SDS) — do not present the EU liquid list as the SG foaming list. Truemeds India lists a "Rose And Cherry Foam Liquid" only as per-ingredient prose plus a partial tail — not a full verbatim list.
• Dettol "Sakura Blossom" body wash: variant/URL mismatch confirmed — Dettol SG's own body-wash index lists only Cool, Fresh, Lasting Fresh, Original, Skincare and Onzen variants; no Sakura Blossom. Do not panel a Sakura Blossom Dettol body wash for SG.
• Dove Beauty Nourishing Body Wash: partial only. SkinSignal confirms 31 ingredients but hides 21 behind "Show all" (not retrievable in text fetch). First 10 verified: Water, Cocamidopropyl Betaine, Sodium Methyl Lauroyl Taurate, Sodium Cocoyl Isethionate, Glycerin, Sodium Chloride, Phenoxyethanol, Carbomer, Styrene/Acrylates Copolymer, Sodium Hydroxide. Not panellable yet.
• Method Mindful Matcha; Island Mist; Aluminum Gel Hand Wash Vanilla Raspberry: no scent-specific lists (only a generic US gel list, which the colourants show is a different blue scent, not Mindful Matcha or Island Mist).
• Lux Magical Spell Body Wash: major conflict — two different lists under the same name (Chemist Warehouse NZ / BIG W AU short list, 14 ingredients, vs INCIdecoder long soap-based list, 33 ingredients). These cannot both be the SG pack. Do not panel either without a pack check. Lux Soft Caress: INCIdecoder list exists but SG sale of that variant was not confirmed; Lux Soft Touch: 34 ingredients per SkinSignal but full list hidden behind "Show all" — not retrieved.
• Cetaphil Gentle Skin Cleanser: formulation conflict — Boots UK current list (10 ingredients, no SLS/parabens) vs an older SG-imported pack reviewed in 2016 (8 ingredients incl. sodium lauryl sulfate and methyl/propyl/butylparaben, "Imported first by Galderma Pte Ltd Singapore"). Which formulation is on SG shelves now is unknown — pack check required.
• Sebamed Liquid Face & Body Wash pH 5.5: converging sources but an order conflict (sodium laureth sulfate vs sodium C14-16 olefin sulfonate swapped between sources). Candidate only, not a settled SG pack list.
• Safeguard Liquid Hand Soap, Fresh Clean (US): EWG US label only; SG variant not confirmed. The DailyMed US antibacterial version instead lists active Chloroxylenol 0.5% — a different formula again.
• Kodomo Head To Toe, Pink Hanabaki: INCIdecoder list exists (17 ingredients) but no SG-pack confirmation in this pass — not panelled.
• QV Wash (standard), QV Gentle Wash, QV Intensive Moisturising Wash, QV Baby Gentle Wash: full lists exist on QV Australia (all contain methylparaben + propylparaben; QV Wash also contains SLS), but SG sale was not confirmed in this pass — not panelled.
• Nivea Shower Gel Creme Care: INCIdecoder list exists (19 ingredients) but SG sale of this specific variant was not confirmed in this pass — not panelled.
• Palmolive Body Wash: two different INCIdecoder entries exist and neither names the SG variant — do not panel either as a named SG variant.
• Pigeon; Johnson's; Everfresh Goat Milk; Bio-Home: no full lists found.
• Walch: SG retailer myCK and ProductNation give only key ingredients (glycerin, aloe vera) — no full list.
• Cold Storage, Giant, Sheng Siong, Don Don Donki, Mustafa, Meidi-Ya, Le Petit Depot, Little Farms, RedMart, Lazada SG, Shopee SG, Watsons SG, Guardian SG: no product-page URLs for these products were returned by search, and no live browser was available — in-store pack photography remains the only route for the items above (especially Kirei Kirei bundles, Shokubutsu, Felce Azzurra, Palmer's, Lifebuoy Cool Fresh) and for settling the conflicts.

Nutrition — what the numbers say

Nutrition information does not apply to hand soap and body wash, and it is not printed for them. Hand soap and body wash are not food or drink: they have no energy, protein, fat, carbohydrate, sugars or sodium content to compare, and no Nutri-Grade. This page therefore does not invent, estimate or borrow any nutrition numbers, and it keeps comparing what the packs do print — the ingredient list — exactly as before.

How to read a hand soap or body wash pack — the jargon, in plain English

SLES (sodium laureth sulfate) / SLS (sodium lauryl sulfate)

The main cleaning (surfactant) ingredients in most body washes on this page. SLES is the ethoxylated form; SLS is the simpler form. Both are listed by name when present — QV Dermcare and GOAT Manuka Honey are the only washes verified here without either.

Cocamidopropyl betaine

A co-surfactant used alongside SLES in most body washes; it helps the lather and thickens the formula.

Soap-based wash (myristic acid + lauric acid + potassium hydroxide)

A traditional soap formula: fatty acids plus an alkali (potassium hydroxide) make soap in the bottle. Lifebuoy Moisture Plus follows this pattern, unlike the SLES-based Dettol washes. The list order shows the fatty acids first — that is the tell.

Antibacterial actives — chloroxylenol, triclocarban, silver oxide, salicylic acid

The actives actually printed on lists here. Chloroxylenol is Dettol's active; Triclocarban is printed for Lifebuoy Moisture Plus only (MY list) — not for all Lifebuoy washes, as the first pass wrongly generalised; Silver Oxide is the active in the Lifebuoy Antibacterial/Total 10 list; Salicylic Acid appears in both Dettol washes. An "antibacterial" claim on the front without a named active in the list should be checked on the pack.

MI/MCI — methylisothiazolinone / methylchloroisothiazolinone

A preservative pair that appears in the Dettol, Lifebuoy and Lux lists here. Named in full on the pack when present.

Parabens — methylparaben, ethylparaben, propylparaben, butylparaben

Preservatives named in full when present (Dettol Lasting Fresh; QV Wash/Gentle Wash/Baby Wash on QV Australia; the old Cetaphil SG-imported list). "Paraben-free" is a label claim; the list is the evidence.

Ceramides (NP, EOP)

Lipids named on the QV Dermcare list. Different ceramide names are different ingredients — this page lists them exactly as printed.

Fragrance / Parfum / Perfume

The scent blend, listed as a single word. Where the pack names individual fragrance allergens (limonene, linalool, citronellol, butylphenyl methylpropional — as in Dettol Lasting Fresh), they appear as separate ingredients, and this page quotes them as printed. "Fragrance-free" on a label means no Parfum entry in the list — Suu Balm and QV Dermcare are the two verified here.

What this page is not

• Not a lab test. Cleaning, moisturising and antibacterial claims were not measured; brand claims are quoted as brand claims.
• Not a ranking, and not a "best" pick. A shorter or longer ingredient list is not a ranking, and a "free-from" label is a label claim, not a verdict.
• Not a price comparison. Prices change weekly; formulations change less often, but still change.
• Not complete. The products in seen-but-not-verified are not yet panelled, for the verification reasons given, not hidden. The first pass's 29 FairPrice lists could not be re-verified in this pass — a live-browser FairPrice pass or pack photos are the step that would close most of the gaps on this page.

Sources and method

Checked 5–6 November 2026. First pass (5 November 2026): FairPrice SG ingredient sections read in a live browser — 29 products recorded with full lists (texts not retained for all). Re-verification pass (5 November 2026): web search + page fetch — FairPrice product pages not indexed by search, no FairPrice product URL returned for any product, no live browser available, so no FairPrice list could be re-fetched. Verified instead: Raffles Health SG (QV Dermcare, strength A); CARiNG Pharmacy MY + INCIdecoder (Suu Balm, strength B); INCIdecoder + SkinSignal (Dettol Lasting Fresh and Cool, strength C); Guardian Malaysia (Lifebuoy Moisture Plus, strength C/D); SkinSort (GOAT Manuka Honey, strength C, order reconstructed). Also checked: Dettol SG (variant index + product pages, no ingredients published), Suu Balm SG (no full list), QV Australia, Chemist Warehouse NZ, BIG W AU, Boots UK, EWG, Truemeds/Apollo India, DoctorOnCall MY. Corrections applied in this pass: Lifebuoy Triclocarban scope corrected to Moisture Plus only; Dettol Sakura Blossom confirmed not an SG variant. Full per-fact source list is in the accompanying research notes.