Talk:Soap/Archives/2020

"Soap" commonly refers to detergent, most of the time.
It seems that the distinction between soap and detergent doesn't matter to the general public, who use "soap" to refer to detergents as well as true soaps. Should we recognize such usage, redefining "soap" to include detergents? Soaps form sticky, insoluble curds when the water used with them contains Ca and Mg ions, but detergents do not. Nikevich 23:25, 29 October 2016 (UTC)

Recommend including: "Although detergent and soap share similar uses and the terms are often used interchangeably, they differ chemically." The reader can then immediately review the detergent article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 157.52.16.239 (talk) 19:42, 28 January 2019 (UTC)

I disagree: "soap" usually refers to what is herein called "toilet soap," i.e. for human skin, whereas "detergent" most often refers to laundry cleaner. 24.244.23.78 (talk) 01:12, 19 January 2020 (UTC)

Is "true soap" made of animal fat?
The section about the history of soap in China says: "True soap, made of animal fat, did not appear in China until the modern era." But other places in this article refers to soaps made of vegetable fat. Am I missing something? Either the whole article should be about this "true soap" made from animal fat, or the section about China should say something like "The Chinese traditionally made lots of soap from vegetable fat, while modern European soaps have become common in modern times." Ornilnas (talk) 09:07, 27 January 2017 (UTC)

I know absolutely nothing about soap, but I'm tempted to just rewrite large parts of the History section if no one addresses this. The current text reads as if Western culture has had "true" soap for thousands of years, while all other cultures only made "soap-like" detergents until recently. Not only does this sound really strange (what is so special about this "true" soap that the word "soap" should refer to only that particular substance?), but as I pointed out above, other places in the article contradicts it. So before I start large-scale editing on a subject I know nothing about (and probably insert a few mistakes in the process), can someone correct me here? --Ornilnas (talk) 20:16, 28 March 2017 (UTC)

I note that the article says that lard is made from suet, which is not the case. In fact, lard is rendered pig fat, and suet is beef or mutton kidney fat.24.244.23.78 (talk) 01:18, 19 January 2020 (UTC)

What is "high impact soap"?
High impact soap redirects to this article, but is not mentioned at all. That defeats the purpose (in my opinion) of a redirect. ZFT (talk) 23:16, 7 August 2019 (UTC)


 * Seems to be a dermatological term, maybe related to bacterial control and the management of acne. It's in the index here:, but not the preview pages. Andy Dingley (talk) 02:00, 19 January 2020 (UTC)

Major revisions Mid-Jan 2018
The large section on soap-making is supported by three references, only one of which is a commercial book that appears to be a hobbyist's soal-making manual. Most soap, one can be sure, is made in factories and none of that is described.--Smokefoot (talk) 21:48, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
 * One idea is to split this article into (1) slightly elaborated disambiguation page, (2) "toilet soaps" (bar soap, etc.), (3) metallic soaps, which would be more industrially related including heavy metal soaps.

--Smokefoot (talk) 14:10, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Advantages to split: gives normal readers who want to read about normal bar soap to have "their page", gives equal opportunity on metallic soaps, which are more obscure to normal people but important in technology.
 * Disadvantages to split: more complicated and readers might want it all in one article, some might not like the term "toilet soap".
 * I sort of agree but I think we should follow WP:COMMONNAME. I expect for most people 'soap' and 'detergent' are the same, so we should open with that and differentiate it from say SLES or LAS. The information on non-sodium salts could but moved to a technically named page such as fatty acid carboxylates - currently the first thing described here in detail is the use of soaps as greases - surely not what most people would expect.--Project Osprey (talk) 14:50, 19 January 2018 (UTC)

Sodium stearate
Sodium stearate gets a mention in two places but there is no explanation of how it relates to soap. Is it an ingredient? Is it found in all soaps? Etc.

This page says it is a soap: Sodium_stearate

History - Roman Empire
Hello, there is a mistake in the section, but I can't edit the page. It says “Aretaeus of Cappadocia, writing in the 1st century AD”, while Aretaeus actually lived in the 2nd century (as you can see from its own article). Best regards --Sirmione65 (talk) 15:44, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
 * ✅, corrected according to your directives.Davidbena (talk) 12:10, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

Article does not do its basic job
First of all, I agree with the notion that this should be split into industrial vs. household soap, since I don't think the general public ever uses the term 'soap' to mean anything other than household. But more importantly, I come to this article curious for an easy explanation of what soap is, and what it does. In the lead: "[S]oap solubilizes particles and grime, which can then be separated from the article being cleaned. Where soaps act as surfactants, emulsifying oils to enable them to be carried away by water." A lay person is not going to know what any of that means, and *soap* of all things is not a specialized topic requiring specialist lingo. Further down: "The insoluble oil/fat molecules become associated inside micelles, tiny spheres formed from soap molecules with polar hydrophilic (water-attracting) groups on the outside and encasing a lipophilic (fat-attracting) pocket, which shields the oil/fat molecules from the water making it soluble. Anything that is soluble will be washed away with the water." Again, not a scientist. I have no idea what any of that means. We've been using soap for thousands of years, but from looking at this page and not being a trained scientist, I have no idea what it does. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 156.98.235.138 (talk) 21:16, 12 March 2020 (UTC)
 * I think part of the problem is that soap is defined by what it does, not what it's made of. It's a verb.  I *think* (but cant confirm right now) that I've even seen triclocarban-based hand sanitizer described as soap on the wall-mounted dispensers found in hospitals.  Then there are the herbal formulas, with no artificial ingredients at all, made from plants such as soapwort, soapweed. soapbush, and more which are not even closely related to each other. To include all of these widely different chemicals as "soap" we have to use broad terminology that may be unfamiliar to readers because most people don't need to talk about five different things at once.  So, I wholly understand your point, but I dont really see how we could use simpler terminology without sacrificing the scope.  — Soap — 15:28, 2 June 2020 (UTC)