List of Natural Soap Plants High in Saponins
An introduction to natural soap plants that can be used as soap thanks to being high in saponins. Includes common plants such as English ivy and soap nuts but others that can be wild harvested and ways to transform plants with saponins into sudsy cleansers.
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Years ago, I taught myself how to make handmade soap, and ever since have shared ways that you can make it too. I focus on making soap in the traditional sense, from fats and alkali and my favorite method is cold process soap making. However, I often receive questions on ways to make soap without having to use lye. There are a few ways to make soap without handling it, but inevitably, all true soap is made with lye. We don’t know how long soap has been around though and in the past, people probably used natural soap plants to make a soap-like substance.
Plants high in saponins only need light processing in water, and sometimes they don’t even need that. After agitating them, a liquid soap substance is released that gently cleanses skin, hair, fabric, and even home surfaces. It’s well worth learning about the fascinating properties and how to use saponin-rich plants and I’ve featured nine of the best soap plants further below. Some include videos showing the plant in action and I highly encourage you to have a try too!
Plants That Can Be Used As Soap
Cultures around the world have used simple plants to clean, and some of us still do. I sometimes use soap nuts for washing clothes, and if you’ve tried them too, you’ve had experience using a saponin. Just like soap, saponin is a surfactant and pulls oil and grime from surfaces. It can also create the bubbles that we associate with soap. Horse chestnut is another commonly used soap plant high in saponins, as is soapwort.
Saponins are a natural plant compound that can dissolve in water, and latch itself to oils. Then the saponin, along with the oil, is washed away by water. We too can use saponins to cleanse our skin, hair, and home and this list of nine of the best soap plants will help you on your way. No matter where you are in the world, there’s bound to be a saponin-rich plant available, whether it’s growing in the garden or a native plant that’s been used for thousands of years.
List of Plants with Saponins
The most well-known saponin-rich plant is soapwort, native to Europe but now found all around the world. The whole plant is high in saponins, but it’s most concentrated in the roots. Other soap plants are very similar and if you decide to try any of them out for yourself, make sure that you don’t introduce the soap into open water sources such as lakes and streams. Saponins are poisonous to fish and other marine life. Also, please do not eat any of these plants as some are poisonous if taken internally.
1. Soapwort
Soapwort Saponaria officinalis (whole plant, especially the roots) is both a wild and cultivated plant from Europe. It’s rich in saponins from its scented flowers to its stems and leaves. Its roots are exceptionally high in saponin content and can be dried and used throughout the year. Modern conservators still use soapwort to clean delicate fabrics such as antique tapestries.
There are a couple of ways to use soapwort too. You can use the entire plant to scour pans and surfaces or make a green-ish infusion by simmering a cup of fresh, chopped plant parts (or half that amount dried) with two cups of water. Cool, strain, and use in cleaning hair, skin, and household cleaning purposes. Soapwort makes a great dish detergent! I include a recipe for using soapwort to make a gentle skin and cleanser cleaner in my book, A Woman’s Garden.
2. English Ivy
English ivy Hedera helix (leaves) Finely chop about sixty of the leaves and boil them for five minutes in 4½ cups of water. Next, take it off the heat and allow it to cool to hand-hot. Squeeze the leaves and agitate the water to disperse the saponins. Strain the liquid and use it in laundry and in cleaning home surfaces. I’ve used it as a good floor cleaner and can recommend it for that use. You can also use a cup at a time to do laundry and store any excess in the fridge for up to a week.
3. Horse Chestnuts
Probably the most common soap plant, the horse chestnut Aesculus hippocastanum is one that many will know as conkers. In Europe, there’s a custom of children playing with the nuts in autumn but we can use the same inedible nuts to make soap. They’re particularly popular for laundry soap and all you need to do is harvest the nuts in autumn, grind up the meat, and infuse in warm water. a 1:2 ratio of pulverized nut and warm water by volume is perfect and in about half an hour you’ll have a milky liquid that you can use to clean your clothes. Use 1/3 a cup per load and keep any extra liquid refrigerated for up to a week. For the long term, harvest, pulverize, dry the nuts and make a little horse chestnut laundry detergent at a time.
4. Soap Nuts
Soap nuts are the most commercially well-known of the soap plants. These saponin-rich nuts come from the soapnut or soapberry tree Sapindus Mukorossi. Native to warm-temperate and tropical places, especially India, this group of up to a dozen different species of shrubby trees produces saponin-filled berries. They’re then dried and resemble brown nuts. You can use them to make liquid detergent, but it’s easier to put them in a small cloth bag and then in with your laundry. Soap nuts are readily available to purchase.
5. Clematis
That’s right, the beautiful climbing plant that you have growing in the garden can be a natural soap plant. It’s not one that I’ve used yet though but from what I gather, you collect both the leaves and flowers, chop, and soak in warm water. One part plant material to two parts warm water. Use as you would warm soapy water on floors and surfaces.
6. Buffaloberry
The berries of the buffaloberry Shepherdia argentea shrub were once collected by Native Americans to make a type of foamy dessert and medicinal teas. The shrubs grow in the western and north-western USA and Canada and the red berries (sometimes yellow) were only ever eaten in small amounts. Buffaloberry, like most saponin-rich plants, can give you an upset stomach. They make good natural soap though and if you can harvest any sustainably, you can mash the fresh berries together on their own or with water to make a natural cleanser. There’s a video showing it in use just above.
7. California Soaproot
Some soap plants grow in very specific regions and the California soaproot Chlorogalum pomeridianum is one of them. Also called the wavyleaf soap plant or amole, It’s a wild, low-growing plant native to California and Oregon in the United States with long blue-green leaves that die back in winter. It also has a tall flower stalk that can emerge after the plant is mature, at five to ten years old. The part high in saponins is a fist-sized bulb with a fibrous brown exterior and a white interior. The crushed bulb interior, or its juices, creates a soap-like lather when added to water and agitated. Another similar species, the Narrow soap leaf plant Chlorogalum angustifolium was also used as soap by Native Americans.
8. Soapbush Tree
There are soap plants on practically every continent and the next one comes from down under. The soapbush tree Alphitonia excelsa is a native Australian tree that has leaves rich in saponins. The video above shows how easy it is to extract the foamy soap-like substance by just using fresh leaves and cold water. Please don’t use saponin plants so close to water sources though since adding it to water has the potential to kill fish. That goes for all soap plants, not just the leaves of the soapbush tree.
9. Soapweed Yucca
Soapweed yucca Yucca glauca is a wild soap plant native to the prairies and great plains of North America. This plant has high amounts of saponin in its roots, which are crushed and either soaked or simmered in water. The bubbly and foamy liquid has traditionally been used as a natural shampoo and cleanser and you could do the same too. When harvesting plants for their roots it can often kill them though so if you’d like to use soap plants sustainably, harvest those that are invasive or that you can use aerial parts only.
How to Extract Saponins from Plants
Because saponins dissolve in water, it’s relatively easy to extract them from plants. All you need to do is soak or boil the plant material, fresh or dried, in water. The amount of plant material to water isn’t exact, and you base it on how much saponin the plant has. With soap nuts, you tend to use five ‘nuts’ (actually fruit) for a load of laundry, but you can reuse them too. They still contain saponin even after being used a couple of times.
My soapnut sachet is usually pretty full since I don’t take them out often and just add a new nut for each load. Warm water dissolves the saponins in the soap nuts and also washes the dirt and saponins away from your clothes. Some plants are higher or lower in saponins, so the amount you use for each type will be different.
I’m using the example of soap nuts because a lot of people use them as they’ve become more readily available in health food shops and online. They’re a fruit that grows on a group of shrubby trees in the soapberry family, but when dried, look a lot like nuts. These Sapindus species shrubs grow in tropical and sub-tropical places like India, so they’re not something that everyone can grow. Fortunately, there are saponin-rich plants that will thrive in temperate climates too.
Natural Soap Making Ideas
Although these amazing plants high in saponins are great at cleansing, even the best soap plants can’t take the place of real soap. If you’d like to try your hand at making homemade soap with natural ingredients, try these easy and eco-friendly recipes that you’ll find here on Lovely Greens. You can also learn more about the seven ways to make handmade soap.
- No Lye Soap Recipe (melt-and-pour)
- Eco-friendly Soap Recipe
- Simple Hot Process Soap Recipe
- 3 Easy Cold Process Soap Recipes
Is it possible to add some natural preservatives so it lasts longer than several days? Since the homemade soap from plants has water I assume that it would go bad in a few days. Thank you :)
That’s true, it will go off in a few days. I’d recommend making it fresh each time though, rather than trying to use preservatives.
Hello Tanya,
I love your site LOVELY GREENS.
Today I saw how we can do soap whithout lye..
I realy want to experient this ideas you gave to us.
Thanks.
Maria
Potuguese woman…
Sorry for my bad english..
❤️
Is there any reason you couldn’t make an infusion of the leaves or roots and use that as your lye water in a normal soap recipe?
I don’t see why not, but also, I don’t see why you’d want to? Soap naturally suds up and wouldn’t be noticeably better with added saponins. These plants are alternatives to using soap since they have mild cleansing properties :)
Excellent information. Thank you
Of all these saponin containing plants, which can I grow from seed in my home or garden to be able to continuously harvest for laundry use? And which plant has the greatest saponin amount per small amount that will give me the biggest bank for the growth effort? Thanks so much.
The best one would probably be soapwort if you live in a temperate region. If not, you’ll need to look into which would be suitable for your climate.
So this was a very interesting read. And I found the article researching how to make bar soap without lye. You never mentioned how to do it with these plants and berries. Could you explain how?
HI Lakisha and there’s no way to use plants to make bar soap, in the way you’re thinking. The plants in this piece are rich in saponins that release into water. They create a sudsy liquid that you can use like soap, but it isn’t soap in the literal meaning of the word.
Very interesting article. Thank you! Question: What about the saponins in quinoa? I grew quinoa last year and you have to soak the grain to remove the saponins. There are a LOT of saponins in there! I put some quinoa in a mesh bag, tied it very tightly with a rubber band, and ran it through my washing machine on cold. There were suds everywhere! You’d have thought I put in detergent! It was a quick, effective way to get rid of the saponins to make the quinoa palatable, but I started to wonder if they could be used for soap.
Absolutely fascinating! Most quinoa that’s available in the shops is already washed but you could experiment with its sudsy action if you had a regular source of unwashed.
Can ivy soap be used on skin?
Some people can get contact dermatitis from ivy (especially the sap) so it’s best used for cleaning laundry and other household purposes.
Hello,
I was a little confused about the possible toxicity of saponins in the environment. Do you know of any source where I can find out more about this subject?
Thanks!
I’m sure that you could find information online, through trusted websites. As I understand it, the only time that saponins cause a real issue in the environment is when they are introduced to natural water sources. Ponds and lakes in particular. Saponins kill fish and other aquatic creatures, which is why saponin-rich plants are used by some cultures to harvest fish. Remember that saponins come from plants, and each naturally evolved to live in its own environment.
Is it possible to use Lychee seeds to make saponins for washing? I read somewhere that Lychee seeds are poisonous so not sure whether I should try this…
Interesting question but I’m really unsure about this one, David.
Also highly irritating to worms. Many years ago, mowrah meal (a saponin) was used to expel worms from soil, due to the reaction of the saponins on the worms mucous membranes.
You know; there is no “safe” soap for fish in their water… or bugs in their earth… soap when used; gives off nitrates and has your toxins mixed in it…. The best way to deal with wash tub water is to first strain/filter it to remove as much of the left over fats and diluted soap before putting it on the ground or on your plants; if you don’t use the sewer or a septic system…. I’ll put my money on the natural saponins over lye-based soap any day.
Hi,
I am new here and new to soap making. In the research stage, actually!
I really don’t want to use lye and this plant based way of getting started is interesting to me. However, how do I get started buying the plants to start making the soaps? Do you have an e-book that specifically talks about the plant based method only?
Thanks!
You’ll need to look for plants in your region Nina — try specialty nurseries that will ship to you? Sometimes online forums can help connect you with others who you can swap/buy from. Sorry no ebooks available, but I do share how to use soapwort in my new physical book, A Woman’s Garden Grow Beautiful Plants and Make Useful things.
Perhaps DavesGarden or r/takeaplantleaveaplant on Reddit would be online communities with plant resources. Also, homemade lye is a possibility (hardwood ash and soft water), if preferable.
Making lye at home from wood ash is not a good idea for skincare products. There’s no way to test how strong the wood lye would be at the end! Meaning that you could make soap and it fails, because the solution is too weak. You could also have a very strong brew and the resulting soap would burn your skin. Always stick with cosmetic-grade sodium hydroxide/potassium hydroxide when making handmade soap.
Hi from what I understand I can use snowberries to make soap as they contain a high amount of saponin and were used by Native Americans. Do you have any information on how to use snowberries? I can’t find anything anywhere and I’m wondering how to make bars of soap with them
Hi Amanda, like all of the other saponin-rich plants in this piece, snowberries can’t make bar soap. The compound in the plant material can create sudsy water with cleaning properties, but not soap as we know it.
Hey thank you so much for the quick reply! Is there anyway to make a liquid soap, or something that could be stored without just like dropping berries into the wash every time? I’m just wondering if maybe by boiling the berries we could separate the saponin and mix it into something?
I’m not sure about snowberries, but I know that you can make a type of liquid laundry detergent with conkers (horse chestnuts). Might be worth experimenting!
Thank you so much! Do you by chance have a recipe for that or a link? I’m having a hard time finding anything
There’s a DIY video above :)
Thank you!
if you live in the so-called United States, there should be plenty of English Ivy growing all around you. learn to identify it and you’ll see it everywhere, or go here https://www.inaturalist.org/observations?place_id=7&taxon_id=55882 and set to your location to see where it grows
it’s highly invasive, so you’re doing the land a favor by taking it. just make sure to cut the vine at shoulder and ankle height so as to kill it (and don’t worry, there’s a basically infinite supply)
if it’s on private property, you can ask them first while also explaining the property damage they’re risking by having it there in the first place (more likely for the tree to fall in a storm, plant can take over, etc)
So called USA??
Ivy is easy to control, trim it when you cut the grass
I found several good sources of rock soapwort/saponaria online including True Leaf Market and Johnny’s Select Seed. BUT, this one is EDIBLE: Mesembryanthemum crystallinum (a variety of succulent iceplant) and I found it at Rare Seeds/Baker Creek. I don’t know if it will be as strong, but I like that it is edible and non-toxic (for people, I don’t know about pets), plus it is pretty cool looking. I just ordered mine, so I do not have it yet, so cannot review it yet. Good luck and God bless!
A new one for me! Brilliant and thank you for sharing, Shellie :)
Question: You mean the English ivy I just trimmed back, being careful not to pull the stems to avoid the allergic-type itching that ensues if I do pull? Does this mean it would not be a good idea for me to use it for personal or household cleaning?
No matter how natural or healthy something is, if YOU are allergic to it, it is not good for YOU. That goes for foods too, and this is coming from someone who is allergic to flax seed, and some essential oils lol. I hope that helps.