Almond Oil (Sweet)
Almond oil (INCI name Prunus Amygdalus Dulcis Oil) is rated 2 on our list, in the low band, and the number is traced: Fulton 1989 graded it 2, or 1 for the refined oil, and Morris and Kwan 1983 graded it 3.
Like every rating here, it is for the raw ingredient tested alone, and a label does not print how much of it a product holds.
Both entries are sweet almond oil, pressed from Prunus amygdalus dulcis; the second also covers the butter made from it. Our list carries both names as separate rows. It rates almond oil 2 and sweet almond oil 3 to 5. The numbers do not overlap, so at least one of them is wrong.
The papers we read grade it 2, or 1 for the refined oil in Fulton 1989, and 3 in Morris and Kwan 1983. The 2 for almond oil matches the grade in Fulton 1989. No paper we read gives the 3 to 5 for sweet almond oil. The list records no source for either number.
Is almond oil comedogenic?
Almond Oil is rated 2 on the comedogenic scale, which is the low band.
A mild, soothing plant oil used as an emollient and carrier oil.
- Comedogenic rating
- 2 out of 5
- Band
- Low: Little plugging in the rabbit-ear test. Fulton 1989 counts 0 to 1 as not significant and 2 as borderline.
- Where the number comes from
- Traced to Fulton 1989 and Morris and Kwan 1983. The section on who rated it prints each grade.
- Composition
- Natural Oil
- Also written as
- No common variants recorded
What a 2 means in practice
One and two are the low band. In the rabbit-ear test, Fulton 1989 counted 0 to 1 as not significant and 2 as borderline. A low grade on a rabbit's ear, which reacts more readily than human skin, is weak evidence of a problem on a person.
Two things change what this number is worth. Ingredients are listed in descending order of concentration, so almond oil near the top of a label matters far more than almond oil at the bottom. And the rating describes the raw ingredient on its own. A 2006 review in the Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology found that a rating for a single ingredient does not reliably predict how a finished formula behaves on human skin. The full story of the scale is here.
Who rated it
Our list gives almond oil 2. These are the figures the published rabbit-ear studies we have read give it, as printed in each paper's table.
| Paper | Grade | Tested as |
|---|---|---|
| Fulton 1989 | Grade 2, or 1 for the refined oil | Tested as Almond oil |
| Morris and Kwan 1983 | Grade 3 | Tested as Sweet Almond Oil |
Our list's figure is within what these papers report.
Similar names, rated separately
These share a source with almond oil or carry it in their name, and each has its own rating on our list. The 2 on this page does not carry over to them, so check the exact name on the label.
Fungal acne
Almond Oil matches rule 4, plant or animal oil or butter , on the fungal acne checker. A plant or animal oil, mostly triglycerides. The rule comes from lab studies of what Malassezia yeast can feed on, and it is not a verdict on any product.
What safety reviewers say
The rating above is about pore plugging in a rabbit-ear test. Whether almond oil is safe to use in cosmetics is a separate question. Below is the conclusion of the Cosmetic Ingredient Review (CIR), a US expert panel, and what the EU ingredient database, CosIng, lists for it. We quote CIR's conclusion as written, read on 31 October 2026.
- Cosmetic Ingredient Review (US)
- In a 2017 review of 244 plant-derived fatty acid oils, sweet almond oil among them, the panel concluded they are “safe in the present practices of use and concentration described in this safety assessment”. Safety Assessment of Plant-Derived Fatty Acid Oils, 2017 (opens in a new tab)
- What it does in a product (EU CosIng)
- Listed as PRUNUS AMYGDALUS DULCIS OIL: skin conditioning. CosIng entry (opens in a new tab)
- EU restrictions
- None. CosIng shows no entry for it in the annexes of the EU Cosmetics Regulation.
What we make of this. CIR's conclusion does not grade pore plugging, so on its own it neither confirms nor contradicts the 2 on our list. A safety review looks at things like irritation, allergy and toxicity at the amounts products use, and the rating is only about pores, so read them side by side.
Common questions
- Is almond oil comedogenic?
- Almond Oil is rated 2 on the comedogenic scale, which is the low band.
- Is almond oil non comedogenic?
- Not exactly. Almond Oil is rated 2, which is the low band rather than 0. Low and non-comedogenic are different things, and only a 0 means the second one.
- What is almond oil's comedogenic rating?
- 2 out of 5 on our list. It is classed as Natural Oil.
Sources we checked this rating against
- Kligman AM, Kwong T. “An improved rabbit ear model for assessing comedogenic substances.” British Journal of Dermatology, June 1979;100(6):699–702. (opens in a new tab) The rabbit-ear assay behind published 0 to 5 comedogenicity grades.
- Fulton JE Jr. “Comedogenicity and irritancy of commonly used ingredients in skin care products.” Journal of the Society of Cosmetic Chemists, November/December 1989;40(6):321–333. (opens in a new tab) Rabbit ear. Each ingredient at 10 percent in propylene glycol unless stated, applied five days a week for two weeks, and graded 0 to 5 from the width of the follicles, measured by micrometer and under the microscope. The paper counts 0 to 1 as not significant, 2 to 3 as borderline and 4 to 5 as positive. Some grades depended on the supplier of the raw material, and some oils were also tested refined.
- Morris WE, Kwan SC. “Use of the rabbit ear model in evaluating the comedogenic potential of cosmetic ingredients.” Journal of the Society of Cosmetic Chemists, August 1983;34(5):215–225. (opens in a new tab) Rabbit ear canal, at the Revlon Research Center. Each material applied undiluted unless stated, once a day five days a week for 14 applications, and graded 0 to 5 by microscope only. The authors set out to recheck earlier results because investigators disagreed.
- Draelos ZD, DiNardo JC. “A re-evaluation of the comedogenicity concept.” Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology, March 2006;54(3):507–512. doi:10.1016/j.jaad.2005.11.1058 (opens in a new tab) Tested finished products on the backs of six people and concluded that “Finished products using comedogenic ingredients are not necessarily comedogenic.”