Pore Clogger Checker
4/5

Is Coconut Oil Comedogenic?

Coconut Oil is rated 4/5 in published comedogenicity lists — rated high on published lists.

Single-source Source: compilation. Only the reproduced compilation lists carry this number; not verified against the original table. How we rate

Also appears on labels as

What it is

Coconut oil is the pressed oil of the coconut kernel — roughly half of it is lauric acid (a 12-carbon saturated fatty acid), with myristic acid the next largest share. That fatty-acid profile is why it feels light and melts on contact, and it is also what the comedogenicity tables react to: lauric and myristic esters sit high in the classic rankings.

Why it's rated 4/5

Whole coconut oil scores 4 in the published rabbit-ear-assay lineage — one of the highest ratings among common plant oils. Virgin and refined grades carry the same label name and the same rating; the fatty-acid profile barely changes with processing.

The exception is Caprylic/Capric Triglyceride — "fractionated coconut oil" — where the lauric and myristic fractions are removed entirely. It rates 1, which is exactly the point of fractionating it.

On the label

Appears as Cocos Nucifera (Coconut) Oil. Where it sits matters: a rinse-off cleanser spends far less time on skin than a leave-on cream with coconut oil in the first three positions. The rating describes the ingredient as tested under sustained contact, so leave-on facial products are where a 4 deserves the most attention; body skin is generally more tolerant.

When this rating can't be trusted

The 4/5 describes the raw ingredient in a rabbit-ear assay, usually at 10% in propylene glycol. It cannot tell you how much is in your product (position on the label is the only clue), what the rest of the formula does to it, or how your skin responds. Finished products containing highly rated ingredients have tested non-comedogenic on human skin (Draelos & DiNardo, JAAD 2006).

Can the 4/5 rating for Coconut Oil be trusted?

Single-source This number comes only from reproduced compilation lists and has not been verified against the original table. Treat it as a screening signal from a copied list, not a measurement you can cite. Source: compilation.

A flag here means look closer — the AAD 1989 threshold for caution — not this product will break you out. Full reasoning and bibliography.

Non-comedogenic swaps

Picks are products labeled non-comedogenic; we don’t test or endorse.

Where the rating comes from

Ratings on this site come from published comedogenicity literature in the Fulton 1989 lineage — the 0–5 tables compiled from ingredient testing and reproduced across dermatology reference lists since. Where values disagree: a named primary source (Fulton 1989) outranks later unattributed lists, so its value is shown and the others are disclosed in the note; where only compilation lists disagree, the higher-caution value is shown. We never publish an invented number, and we never present one as more certain than its source: every rating carries a confidence tier — established (primary-source value, no disagreement on record), single-source (only the reproduced compilation lists carry it), or contested (published values disagree or depend on grade and vehicle; the note says which value is shown and why). Ingredients we cannot match appear as “not in our database” — unmatched, not cleared: no published list we hold rates them under that name, and that is not a pass.

Our flag threshold follows the American Academy of Dermatology's Invitational Symposium on Comedogenicity (J Am Acad Dermatol 1989): substances scoring 0–2 in the rabbit-ear assay are unlikely to clog pores in humans, while scores above 2 warrant more caution — which is why this site flags 3/5 and up. Read the full methodology and bibliography.

Related ingredients

Check your whole product

Paste the full ingredient list to see every flagged ingredient at once.