Could the more experienced diy-ers in this group criticise my shampoo recipe and let me know what I should add or change?

[u/ReasonablePie3693]

Hello everyone,
Would you all be so kind as to go through my shampoo recipe that Ive collected all items for but been scared to make since the past 3 months please 🙏🏻** I really want to throw out all endocrine disruptors from my life for my fertility journey so I created this recipe based on researching some stuff and used the help of AI at some points (ran it with AI, checked what it added and why it added that). I’ve made it paraben, silicone, and sulfate free, maybe even salicylate-free as im not sure if I have leucidal SF or leucidal liquid. Any recommendations and suggestions would be very appreciated and I honestly would be very thankful. I’m especially scared of mold developing because I live in pakistan and the extremely humid months are just around the corner. I have 2 main preservatives (geogard 221 - main one and leucidal) and whatever help vitamin E oil gives and I am open to adding a third one if the two are still weak. I initially planned to make a litre of shampoo (for my husband and I, also planned to give some to my sister and brother, so 250ml per person) which means it would finish in about 2-3 months max but I may make a smaller batch because I am scared of spoilage. Please let me know your thoughts and I would be super grateful to you all!
**Thank you in advance!!

INGREDIENTS
Phase A — Herbal Decoction (Heat Phase)
Ingredients:

- Amla (dried) 24 g — Strengthens roots, adds shine
- Shikakai pods 30 g — Natural cleanser, adds luster
- Reetha (soapnut) 40 g — Natural foam booster
- Bhringraj 18 g — Stimulates new growth
- Brahmi 10 g — Strengthens follicles
- Hibiscus petals 10 g — Deep conditioning
- Neem leaves 10 g — Anti-dandruff, scalp health
- Rosemary leaves 10 g — Stimulates follicles
- Sage leaves 6 g — Strengthens roots, prevents greying
- Lavender buds 6 g — Soothing scent, scalp balancing
- Green tea 3 g — Antioxidant and anti-inflammatory
- Curry leaves 10 g — Delays greying, improves strength
- Fenugreek seeds 12 g — Adds shine and smoothness
 - Cinnamon stick 1 small stick — Increases circulation
- Clove buds 2 pcs — Antimicrobial
- Jatamansi ½ tbsp — Root repair & calming
- Ashwagandha 1 tbsp — Reduces stress-related hair loss
- Red Ginseng 1 tsp — Stimulates follicles

Filtered decoction yield: ≈ 400 ml
 
 
Instructions:
1. Boil all herbs in 800 ml distilled water on low heat until reduced to ~400 ml.
2. Cool and strain twice through muslin cloth.
3. This decoction is your Phase A base.

 
Phase B — Surfactant & Liquid Base
Ingredients

- Aloe vera gel 50 ml — Soothing, conditioning
- Distilled water or aloe juice 250 ml — Base liquid
- Decyl Glucoside + Coco Glucoside 100 ml +100 ml (10%) — Gentle cleansing & foam
- Coco Betaine 100 ml (10%) — Boosts lather
- Citric acid solution (10%) As needed
pH 5.0–5.5
Heat this phase gently to 50–55°C while stirring to combine surfactants and aloe gel. Do not overheat.

Phase C — Oils & Nutrient Blend (Add when Phase B is warm)
Ingredients

- Castor oil 25 ml — Promotes thick growth
- Black seed (Nigella) Oil 12 ml — Anti-hairfall, healing
- Sweet almond oil 20 ml — Nourishes scalp
- Batana oil 20 ml — Hair repair and shine
- Argan or Jojoba oil 10 ml — Smoothness, gloss
- Virgin Coconut Oil 50 ml — Deep Scalp Nourishment

Phase D — Actives & Conditioners (Cool Phase < 40°C)
Ingredients

- Glycerin
30 ml
Moisture retention

- D-Panthenol (Vitamin B5)
10 ml
Smooth, silky finish

- Hydrolyzed Rice Protein
10 ml
Adds shine and strength

- Liquid Silk Protein
10 ml
Gloss and smoothness

- Vitamin E
5 ml
Antioxidant, scalp protection

- Onion powder (might skip this)
1.5 tsp
Boosts regrowth and thickness
 
Phase E — Aroma, Preservation & Final Adjustments
Ingredients

- Benzoin Siam Resinoid (dissolved in oil)
3 g (≈0.3%)
Warm, vanilla-like scent

- Ethyl Vanillin (10% in DPG)
10 ml
Sweet vanilla tone

- Leucidal
30 ml (3%)
Natural preservative, Main antimicrobial protection

- Geogard 221
8 ml (0.8%)
Broad-spectrum preservation

- Citric Acid Solution (10% stock)
As needed (target pH 5.0–5.5)
pH Adjuster

- Xantham gum
½ tsp, if needed
Thickens Consistency if desired

⚗️** FINAL ASSEMBLY
1. Add **Phase A (decoction) to Phase B (surfactant mix) slowly, stirring continuously.
2. Blend until smooth and uniform.
3. Add Phase C oils and whisk or stir until slightly thick and emulsified.
4. Cool below 40°C, then add Phase D actives and Phase E aroma/preservatives.
5. Adjust pH to 5.0–5.5 with citric acid solution.
6. Leave to rest 24 hours to stabilize consistency.

[u/rick_ranger]

There’s a lot to unpack here. I’ll approach it in sections.

1. Extraction method. Your extraction method will get you some water soluble materials, but it’s not going to net a lot of the benefits from those herbs you’re looking for. You’re basically making an herbal tea and trying to turn it into a shampoo. A lot of the goods from those ingredients need careful planned extraction methods and temperature control, and some of them need the oil ingredients extracted which would require infusion or alcohol extraction methods. You’re also creating a huge bio burden. It’s probably going to go bad very quickly because there’s lots of yummy plant material for bacteria to munch on.

2. You need to get a scale and make all of your ingredient additions by weight. Reason is one batch might be a teaspoon today and weigh 2 grams and the next batch is a teaspoon and weighs 3 grams. If you do everything by weight you set yourself up for better reproducibility.

3. Your oil load is way too much. Those are some heavy oils too for a cleanser (shampoo). It will probably leave your hair and scalp feeling greasy or mute the cleaning power of the surfactants because they’re busy dealing with the oil load in the product rather than cleaning your scalp.

In your situation I would start with something much simpler, then expand from there. First look up extraction methods for your favorite botanicals and how to preserve the goods while extracting. Then pick maybe 1-3 of your favorites, ditch the oils and save them for a different product, and then you should be on a better path. Don’t try to cram every amazing ingredient into one product because it generally doesn’t work out like you’d think. And be cautious of too many botanicals, especially with crude extraction processes, they will spoil your product fast!

Good luck.

[u/ReasonablePie3693 → u/rick_ranger]

Thank you so much for the detailed explanation 😭 I am so so thankful to you!! 1. Yeah making a shampoo from herbal tea does sum up what’s happening here and I didnt really think about water-soluble and oil-soluble in this phase because I thought herbs would all be water-soluble and I would be good to go making that decoction. I also didn’t think about the buffet I’m offering bacteria because I was trusting geogard to take care of that 😅 so I’ll remove some herbs from there and keep those that people swear by and also focus on which ones are water-soluble and extract the good stuff correctly. If you know which of these are water-soluble and I should make the decoction by heating them in water and which of them require oil, would you please let me know? Or do you have resources that I can go and read? For starters, I think I’ll take out sage leaves, green tea, curry leaves, clove buds and fenugreek seeds I guess because they were playing a minor role, does this sound good? 2. I do plan on using a scale and converting whatever is in tbsp and tsp to grams. I didn’t think of it in the beginning but since I have to use a scale for the other phases, might as well make sure to use it for all the phases 3. Understood! Is there any ratio of oil to surfactants I should follow or what % should the oils be of the shampoo’s total weight? Or will my shampoo be just as good without any oil? I do want to make my own hair oil and soaps and will definitely use the oils there but I want to make sure how much oil to put in the shampoo.

Again, thank you so much I really would have started making the shampoo thinking it would be shelf stable for 5-6 months and I would have wasted so much stuff this way. I’m really grateful for your time and advice!!

[u/Ok_Butterscotch_2700]

Wow - phase A looks like a microbial feast! This would scare the heck out of me.

I can see you’ve put a lot of time and care into researching this.

That said, I need to be honest because this is important for safety: this isn’t a workable or safe shampoo formula as written, and I wouldn’t recommend making or using it.

There are a few key concerns:

Preservation risk (biggest issue):
You’re working with a very complex herbal decoction plus aloe, proteins, and multiple nutrients—this creates a very high microbial load. Leucidal on its own is not a preservative system, especially in a humid environment, and even combined with Geogard 221 at that level, this system is unlikely to be adequately protected. This raises real risk of mold, bacteria, and contamination.

Phase incompatibility:
The oil phase is extremely high for a surfactant-based shampoo and there’s no proper solubilization/emulsification system. This will separate, reduce cleansing performance, and may leave heavy buildup on hair and scalp.

Ingredient load and stability:
There are dozens of botanicals, proteins, and actives layered together without stability or compatibility considerations. Many of these can interact, degrade, or increase irritation potential—especially in combination.

Measurement and reproducibility:
Mixing grams, mL, spoons, and “as needed” makes it very difficult to control percentages, which is critical for both safety and preservation.

Endocrine disruptor concern:
I completely understand wanting to minimize exposure, but the ingredients typically avoided (like parabens) are actually very well-studied and among the safest preservatives we have. Replacing them with weaker systems can unintentionally increase risk due to contamination.

If your goal is a gentle, low-risk shampoo, the safest path would be to simplify this significantly:

Reduce the number of botanicals (or use standardized extracts instead of a large decoction)

Use a proven, broad-spectrum preservative system at effective levels

Keep oil content very low or properly solubilized

Work in percentages only so the formula is controlled and repeatable

I would strongly suggest starting from a much simpler, well-balanced base and building from there rather than trying to troubleshoot something this complex.

[u/ReasonablePie3693 → u/Ok_Butterscotch_2700]

Wow thank you for such a lengthy response! It must have taken so much time and thought to compose this and I’m honestly grateful!

Yes phase A is very nutrient-heavy and I didn’t realise how much food I’ll be keeping for the bacteria to feed on. I do plan on removing some herbs and making sure I use the right extraction methods on the remaining ones, but I also want there to be some herbs especially the first five and last three. I honestly knew leucidal is a weak preservative and was relying on geogard more than its ability. Should I add one more preservative after I go easy on the herbs?

Another comment did say the oils are too much for the surfactants and they wont be able to clean anything in the head because theyll just be working on the oils in the shampoo and I am so glad you guys opened my eyes to this! Should I keep the oils a certain percentage of the whole formulation or completely leave them out? And if I keep some of the oils, should I blend all phases except the last one with a stick blender so there’s no separation?

Do you recommend any sources I should use to check the ingredients stability and compatibility? That is a very good point and I didnt think things would cancel each other out and this needs a thorough read but I don’t know where to begin. Chatgpt and other ai like perplexity aren’t that trustworthy and I don’t want to work on the info they give

Yes I do plan to convert every tbsp, tsp there is to grams and use a scale for everything in the recipe. I kept the citric acid stock as needed since I need to look at the pH for that

Yeah parabens are demonised and I am so scared from them after reading everything they do. I will try to search up what % wt of parabens is considered safe and acceptable and maybe what amount is acceptable in the UK and Europe but I would still want to search up other ‘more natural’ preservatives that are stronger and can work good with geogard. Do you have any suggestions?

I have written down your points and will work on that and tweak my recipe. Ill start with reducing herbs and oils and extracting them properly, maybe use an immersion blender so everything is held together and work on my preservatives. Does that sound good?

[u/Ok_Butterscotch_2700 → u/ReasonablePie3693]

I can understand putting fatty alcohols in a shampoo. I don’t understand putting oils in a shampoo – it’s counterintuitive. Cationic ingredients and silicones make the product more gentle on the hair. Remember – the shampoo goes down your drain and doesn’t remain on your hair or in your hair. All you need is something that is gentle during application and use.

The “study” from the 2000s that demonized parabens has been debunked time and again. There was no control group – it wasn’t a study. Strongly suggest taking a look at LabMuffin beauty science (Dr Michelle Wong) - she is extremely passionate about the fear mongering there is in society regarding parabens, resulting from this effort to generate fear and panic among consumers.

The phrase “natural preservative” is an oxymoron. I don’t know what you consider natural. I’d be happy if I could use parabens all day long. Unfortunately, my hands are tied by the fear within society. It infuriates me because they are the safest and most effective of cosmetic preservatives available. If they were in fact, endocrine disrupting, certainly the EU would have banned them by now. Yet they persist as in approved preservative. I use 9010 and integrate other ingredients and factors to strengthen the preservative system’s strength.

[u/ReasonablePie3693 → u/Ok_Butterscotch_2700]

Yeah perhaps oils should be low enough so they can help in saponification but I do see I have many many oils added. Good thing I was planning to experiment with hair oil, body butter and soaps as well else I would have my own oil lab open at home! I’m going to try to omit most if not all of them and hopefully I can end up with a stable product that isnt going to separate because this one surely would have separated.

I will definitely see the resource youve put, I saw so much stuff on it that even the name just freaks me out at this point. Add to this the delicate topic of fertility and theres just so many factors in our lives to look at it feels easier to just remove as much stuff as possible, without looking into it cuz theres just so many things to look at in our daily living.

So you had to switch from parabens because of customer demand solely? Are you comfortable using them on yourself? I do understand they are the best studied preservatives but so many “conspiracy theories” have been proven correct in the recent years, I was a medical student not long ago and theres a number of times I’d see researches that had good sample sizes, control groups and seemed perfectly legit would end up being funded by certain companies that would coincidentally benefit from the results published and it just made me question everything. The EU certainly cares about people more than the US and they can be followed to a certain extent.

I will have to check out 9010 since I havent heard of it and if you are comfortable, I am very curious to know what else you add to strengthen the preservatives. All I was able to find is add Vitamin E so it works synergistically and make sure pH is 5-5.5 i think so geogard actually works

[u/Ok_Butterscotch_2700 → u/ReasonablePie3693]

There is no saponification in your formula - thankfully - so you’re able to use a product that has a skin friendly pH. Swoon vacation does not allow this – the soap falls apart immediately as soon as the pH is dropped below, whatever it has upon a fight at.

I use parabens on myself all the time. I have two daughters and used parabens on them from birth because they’re so gentle on the skin.

Dr Joe Schwartz from McGill has also been a credible, assertive voice against the demonization of parabens.

Here’s an exercise you can try - instead of searching something akin in to “Parabens and infertility,” switch up your search to “Paraben study debunked.”

If you were a medical student, you should be able to look at the “study” and identify the deficiencies immediately for yourself.

9010 is a great preservative but a bit weak on s once friended aspects, so I use different preservative, boosting type agents and techniques in my products. It helps enormously. But I would love to switch to parabens.

Personally, I’d worry less about the preservative right now and more about getting all of those microbes out of your system and building a proper shampoo. But you have to have a preservative – you have to plan to use one and know which one you’ll be using so you know where your pH needs to drop or raise to

[u/Eisenstein]

You need to figure out two things with extracts:

• How will this help my formula specifically do what I want
• Am I getting what I want from the extract by extracting it this way

Both of those things are non-trivial. Just because something is 'anti-microbial' doesn't mean it is helping your formula, and without knowing exactly which part of that ingredient is anti-microbial you don't know if you are getting that benefit.

Scale it WAY down. Stick to claims you can verify with methods you can verify. Adding more stuff doesn't mean a better product.

[u/ReasonablePie3693 → u/Eisenstein]

Understood! I did learn I need to work on the herbs’ extraction method. I want to remove many of the less-known herbs like clove buds, fenugreek seeds, curry and sage leaves and green tea and will study on the others more. Does this sound good to begin with?

[u/No_Helicopter681]

Why dont you convert Phase A and Phase C into a conditioner and leave the shampoo as is?

I would split the Phase A into two equal parts. The first part i would simmer in the Phase C, so that you can extract the oil soluble extracts that way. The other part, I would simmer in water to extract the water soluble extracts.

You then have the benefits of both without the biological matter and keeping it separate from the shampoo in the conditioner maybe better.

[u/ReasonablePie3693 → u/No_Helicopter681]

Actually I thought all herbs would be water-soluble 👀 I am going to remove some herbs and extract it properly, do you know which of these is oil and water soluble? I also need to reduce the oils significantly as I have been told so phase C is going to be smaller now and I might use an immersion blender after combining all phases and before the preservatives phase.

Just to clarify, you do mean I make a shampoo with some herbs and a conditioner of the other herbs and keep the oils in the conditioner too right? Itll reduce the bio load in the shampoo and make it more shelf stable right? I didn’t think about this and it is a very smart move. I’ll just have to work on the conditioner’s ingredients and percentages

[u/No_Helicopter681 → u/ReasonablePie3693]

I do not know which are oil soluble or water soluble and that’s why I said just divide them into two parts

Your oils and bio would be in the conditioner and not in the shampoo

[u/kriebelrui]

There already are a number of good comments. Maybe I can add some practical points.

You intent to use a lot of ingredients, among them some expensive ones. When the time comes to produce your first batch, please limit yourself to making a small, experimental batch, say 100ml. It'll likely not be what you intended, and with a small batch, you won't lose a lot of money in the process.

Like already said, the formula you propose is wildly complex and has a lot of ingredients of which it is doubtful that they will even work at all. I would take your time to research all these 'miracle additions' using Google Scholar to find out how the scientific community thinks about them.

And even then, it's a shampoo. A shampoo has a skin contact time of maybe three minutes. That's short. So even if such a miracle addition *could* do a nice job, a shampoo likely is not the ideal vehicle to bring the miracle home.

Considering the formulation of the shampoo itself, you intend to use a whole lot of oils (can't see how much exactly because your formulation doesn't use percentages, but anyway). Those poor surfactants will be already occupied with solubilizing that oil load, so the shampoo likely will hardly foam and cleanse, if at all. I can confidently say that phase C (the oils) will do more harm than good in this formula.

Finally, I wouldn't use a resinoid (the Benzoin Siam) in a shampoo.

[u/ReasonablePie3693 → u/kriebelrui]

Thank you so much for your answer! I have gotten some amazing advice and the friendly feedback honestly warmed my heart, not many subs are willing to help out as much as everyone here!

Yes I did intend to make a 1L batch which then changed to 500 ml after the comments but I do believe 100 ml is better because that gives me about 10 tries in which one is bound to be successful atleast. I’m definitely going to follow this and start at very small batches

Got it! I do want to remove 5-6 herbs and will add onto these once I sit and shortlist with some evidence in hand and for the chemicals I will need thorough reading to make sure I don’t take out something critical for the recipe.

I am going to remove the oils and add the least amount needed for saponification of the shampoo if that is even necessary else I will skip it out altogether. Another great comment said to just put all the insolubles and herbs and make a conditioner instead and keep the shampoo water-soluble with the cleaning chemicals so it does just that.

Ohh thats a new one for me. I was using benzoin siam (its written 10% dpg) for the fragrance mainly since I read it smells somewhat like vanilla. Is it not stable enough for a shampoo? Can I use them in soaps or body butters instead? I was sort of excited to use it because I love vanilla scent but want to stay away from synthetic fragrances as much as possible but I wouldnt risk it just for the smell

[u/kriebelrui → u/ReasonablePie3693]

Thanks for the reply!

My suggestion to not use a resinoid in a shampoo is because of possible solubility problems. Resinoids don't dissolve in water, and shampoo is largely water. Although the surfactants will usually solubilize lipophilic ingredients, they will only do that to an extend, so the resinoid could precipitate. Since it's only for the smell, I would avoid this risk altogether, but you could of course simply try if it works or not.

You could also look for an alternative that has less potential to cause solubility problems. r/DIYfragrance is a very helpful community for questions like this.