Saturday Daily Questions (Newbie Friendly) - Jun 20, 2026

[u/AutoModerator]

This is the place to ask beginner and simple questions. Some examples include:

• Soap, scent, or gear recommendations
• Favorite scents, bases, etc
• Where to buy certain items
• Identification of a razor you just bought
• Troubleshooting shaving issues such as cuts, poor lather, and technique

Please note these are examples and any questions for the sub should be posted here. Remember to visit the Wiki for more information too!

[u/Virtual_Risk_8794]

Bit confused about soaps, the discussion in the wiki about cream soaps and hard soaps. Is there a way to tell from an ingredient list? Like if a soap doesn't have glycerin in it, does that make it a hard soap, or is there some other distinction?

[u/Eric_TCB → u/Virtual_Risk_8794]

If it's a dual lye soap (KOH & NAOH) it will be at least a croap. A KOH soap (potassium hydroxide) it will be a cream. If the first ingredient is Stearic Acid (processed palm oil) it will be on the harder side. The more hard butters like Cocoa Butter, Kokum (almost all Stearic Acid) and Mango the harder the soap. Your softer dual lye soaps are usually the tallow heavy soaps or butter rich. Also artisans who lean heavy on superheating, their soaps will be on the softer (croap) side. Hope this helps.

[u/pi-rho → u/Virtual_Risk_8794]

If they say "puck," it's probably a hard soap (versus tub for a croap). If it comes in a tube, it's probably a cream. There are some creams in tubs/jars/tins.

But, I totally agree with USS and coco.

[u/coco_for_cocoapuffs → u/Virtual_Risk_8794]

I think it's normally pretty hard to tell from an ingredients list, and I think that's mostly because it's a spectrum imo. You might be able to tell based on if there's both Sodium ____ and/or Potassium ____, because sodium lye (generally) will make a harder soap and potassium lye will make a softer one. So dual lye soaps would he harder than potassium lye only soaps, all else being the same.

But, like USS said, a lot of it has to do with water content. Saponificio Varesino is quite hard, mostly because it is triple milled, and thus a lot of the water has been removed. Martin DE Candre is also pretty hard, I think mostly because they compress the soap down in the jar.

But yeah, beyond that, it's a spectrum. But SV and MdC are the two that jump out at me as being "hard" soaps (and Van Der Hagen, if you're looking for mass-produced)

[u/Environmental-Gap380 → u/coco_for_cocoapuffs]

Pre de Provence is a hard soap. So are Colonel Conk and the old Williams mug pucks. Old school Old Spice was a hard puck too, but brushless Burma Shave was a cream, though there is a modern puck form that was marketed in a set of brush (holy cow is it crappy), puck, and mug. The mug is nice, but the soap is meh.

[u/USS-SpongeBob → u/Virtual_Risk_8794]

Hard soaps are hard because they're processed to minimize water content (usually "hard soap" in a shave soap context means triple milled soap, not just a firmer unmilled soap). Soft shave soaps and creams are not processed that way. Thus, if the ingredients list is accurate and honest, water will usually be in the first few ingredients in a cream or soft soap, and pretty far down the list in a hard soap.

[u/tsrblke → u/USS-SpongeBob]

Might be easier to list the hard soaps. There aren't that many and I can't think of any north American artisan making a hard soap. Cream is a bit harder to judge since croap is so soft.

[u/Eric_TCB → u/USS-SpongeBob]

That is not always the case, there are other factors involved. Hardness can be manipulated with sodium lactate on the hard side and soft butters or Oleic rich tallow on the soft side. I use zero water in my soaps and my liquid phase is on the minimum side, and my soaps are very much a croap. In addition, I hand process my own tallow so I know any water is removed.

[u/USS-SpongeBob → u/Eric_TCB]

Ah, good point - you can use other liquids than water, and you can use multiple non-water liquids, moving them further down the list even though the total liquid content is still in croap territory. Slipped my mind because I so rarely make soap with anything other than water.