How Sláinte reads the label on pads and tampons, toiletries, skin care and cleaning products.
Anything you put on your skin or hair is scored on its ingredients only. There are no calories to count, so the question is which ingredients have been flagged by EU safety reviewers and how high up the list they sit.
What the colours mean
This covers period products, cleaning and laundry, baby wipes, deodorant, toothpaste, sun cream, soap, shampoo and moisturiser.
Both do the same job. One is soap made from plant oils. The other contains BHT and several ingredients that often irritate skin.
Better choice · 1 of 2
Sonett
96
/100
Sláinte Score
Excellent
Nothing on this label needs a second look.
Scored on the ingredient list, the way personal-care products are judged. There is no nutrition panel on a wash.
14 ingredients on the label
Nothing on this label carries an attention flag.
Softsoap
23
/100
Sláinte Score
Bad
BHT is what caps this score.
Scored on the ingredient list, the way personal-care products are judged. There is no nutrition panel on a wash.
18 ingredients on the label
BHT carries a high-risk flag, and that alone keeps this product out of the good range.
This is exactly what you would see after scanning each one. Both are scored on the real label.
The worse the ingredient, the more points it takes away. A red one takes away 30, a green one takes away nothing. The final score is whatever is left.
Labels list ingredients from most to least. Something in the top five makes up a big part of the bottle, so it takes away its full points. Further down there is less of it, so it takes away less. For example, an orange ingredient takes away 12 points near the top but only about 8 near the bottom.
One perfume can contain many similar ingredients. They are really one issue, so the first takes away its full points, the next two take away about a third as much, and any more after that take away almost nothing.
Highest possible score 49, if it has one high-risk ingredient, such as BHT or triclosan
Highest possible score 24, if it has two or more high-risk ingredients
Each dark bar shows the highest score a product can get if it breaks that rule. Even if everything else on the label is fine, it cannot go past that number.
This is the real ingredient list for barcode 0074182268008, run through the same scoring the product page uses. These are the ingredients that took the most points away, and why:
Each coloured block is a share of the ingredients on this label, grouped by how worrying they are.
The black line shows the ceiling of 49 this product hit. The circle shows where its final score of 23 lands: red is Bad, orange Poor, yellow Good, green Excellent.
| Product | What we read | What we watch for |
|---|---|---|
| Pads, tampons and liners | What they are made from: top layer, core, backing, glue | Added scent, dyes, chlorine bleaching, lotions on the surface |
| Cleaning and laundry | Ingredient list | Strong irritants and scent. The product page talks about gloves and fresh air, not skin care |
| Baby wipes and nappies | Ingredient or materials list | Added scent, harsh preservatives such as methylisothiazolinone |
| Deodorant and toothpaste | Ingredient list | Triclosan, unnamed perfume, foaming agents that irritate |
| Skin, hair and sun care | Ingredient list | Restricted preservatives, ingredients being studied for effects on hormones, common perfume allergens |
Pads and tampons sit against the body for hours, so their materials get their own list. Always Ultra Day pads list 19 materials; with all 19 rated, they score 65 (Good).
Each ingredient is checked against EU cosmetics law (EC 1223/2009), the opinions of the EU scientific committee on consumer safety, and the EU ingredient database CosIng.
| Risk level | Points taken away | What lands here | Examples |
|---|---|---|---|
| High | 30 | Restricted or banned in the EU, being studied for effects on hormones, or releases formaldehyde | BHT, DMDM hydantoin, methylisothiazolinone, triclosan |
| Moderate | 12 | Unnamed perfume, foaming agents and dyes that often irritate | Parfum, cocamide MEA, Ext. Violet 2 |
| Low | 4 | Sulfates, PEG compounds, mild preservatives, perfume allergens | Sodium laureth sulfate, PEG-7, sodium benzoate, limonene |
| No concern | 0 | Water, gentle bases and skin softeners | Aqua, glycerin, panthenol, shea butter |
Some ingredients are not in our list yet. We show them as 'not rated yet'. They never count as safe, and the score tells you how much of the label we could check.
| Rule | What it does | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Top of the list | Places 1 to 5 count in full, 6 to 10 at 85%, 11 onwards at 70% | Ingredients are listed by amount, so the top of the list is most of the bottle |
| Similar ingredients | The second and third of the same kind count at 30%, later ones at 10% | Eleven perfume allergens from one perfume are one perfume problem |
| Floor | A label can lose at most 85 points | Keeps the very bottom for products with high-risk ingredients |
| One high-risk ingredient | Highest possible score 49 | A clean list should not hide one ingredient you may want to avoid |
| Two or more high-risk | Highest possible score 24 | Several restricted ingredients on one label is a pattern |
| No full list | Fewer than 4 ingredients, or none we recognise: no score | A two-word marketing line is not an ingredient list |
You do not eat it, so calories, sugar and salt tell you nothing. A shampoo, pad or detergent is scored only on what its ingredient or materials list says it contains.
EU law sets the line for what may be sold. Sláinte flags ingredients where the SCCS or dermatology research has raised a question about allergy, irritation or hormone activity, so you can decide for yourself. Legal and unflagged are not the same thing.
Lavender, citrus and tea tree oils contain limonene, linalool and similar compounds that are among the most common causes of fragrance allergy. Where the oil came from does not change how skin reacts to it.
Yes. EU labels list ingredients from most to least down to 1%, so a flag in the first five places counts in full, places six to ten count at 85% and anything later at 70%.
One high-risk ingredient caps the score at 49 however clean the rest of the list is, and two cap it at 24. The cap exists so a good list cannot hide one ingredient you may want to avoid.
Every score is worked out by these rules and nothing else. Brands cannot pay for a better score or a place in the swaps. If you think we got one wrong, tell us and we will check it.
