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The best soaps for staying clean in the woods
The best soaps for staying clean in the woods (Photo: Sarah Jackson)
Gear Guy

What Are the Most Versatile Camping Soaps?

You want something that's powerful enough to keep you and your gear clean

Published: 
The best soaps for staying clean in the woods
(Photo: Sarah Jackson)

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A lapse in good hygiene is understandable when you鈥檙e camping鈥攖o a point. You need to have some way to clean yourself and your equipment;聽otherwise, you could be聽inviting聽all kinds of gut-busting bacteria and bugs into your life. The solution: bring trail soap. I put these five through three weeks of head-to-head testing to determine the best.

But before we dive in, a quick PSA. I chose all biodegradable soaps, but just because they鈥檙e environmentally friendly doesn鈥檛 mean it鈥檚 OK to bathe, clean your dishes, or wash your clothes directly in a water source with them. The soaps do break down, but it takes a while, and they can wreak havoc on local plants and animals in the meantime. Please wash yourself or anything else (and dispose of any leftover sudsy water) 300 or more feet away from rivers, streams, and lakes.

The Test

Like I mentioned, I chose biodegradable soaps. My other two criteria were that they were聽liquid and portable鈥攅asy to take along while camping.

I broke the testing up into two parts: personal hygiene and camp hygiene. I started by using each of these soaps in my shower at home, noting how well they cut through dirt and grease from my hair. To focus specifically on their stink-mitigating power, I started by not showering for a full day. During those 24 hours, I exercised twice, which got me nice and sweaty. Before I got in the shower, I asked my lovely and long-suffering wife to smell my armpits and rate me (on a scale of one to ten) on how badly I stunk. Then I used a dime-size application to lather and scrub my pits in the shower and had my wife smell and rate me again. I went through this whole process for each soap, and she didn鈥檛 know which one I was using each time.

For the camp-hygiene portion, I poured 14 cups of water and one tablespoon of soap into a bucket. I then used the mixture to wash a dish that I had smeared with one teaspoon of peanut butter. I also picked a well-soiled cotton T-shirt from my hamper and washed it with the same water-soap combo and hung it on a line to dry.

The Results

Winner: Dr. Bronner鈥檚 Organic Liquid Soap ($4 for two ounces)

(Sarah Jackson)

Pre-Shower Sniff Test: 7.5/10鈥斺淵ou smell like you just got back from raft guiding for a month.鈥
Post-Shower Sniff Test: 3/10鈥斺淚t鈥檚 incredible what mint can do to mask body odor.鈥
Hair: 3.5/5
Dishes: 4.5/5
Clothes: 4.5/5

This took the win for its versatility. Dr. Bronner鈥檚 performed every task well. It imbued whatever it was cleaning with a nice dose of peppermint and fought odor in both my pits and the shirt. Even though it was one of the more runny soaps in the test, it was among the most effective at cutting through the grease in my hair and the peanut butter. Dr. Bronner鈥檚 won on its performance alone, but it doesn鈥檛 hurt that it鈥檚 easy to find just about anywhere in the U.S.


2. Campsuds ($4 for two ounces)

(Sarah Jackson)

Pre-Shower Sniff Test: 5/10鈥斺淵ou smell earthy.鈥
Post-Shower Sniff Test: 3/10鈥斺淭here鈥檚 still something there, but I wouldn鈥檛 notice if my nose wasn鈥檛 in your armpit.鈥
Hair: 3.5/5
Dishes: 4/5
Clothes: 4.5/5

didn鈥檛 do as well as some others here as a straight-up body wash. But it did a good enough job of getting me clean, and greasy hair and peanut butter couldn鈥檛 stand up to it. The Campsuds left both the dishes and the shirt clean, with minimal scrubbing on my part. It wasn鈥檛 too thick, so the soap washed out easily but still worked up to a good lather. The shirt rinsed completely out in about three squeezes and hung on to a fresh, but not overpowering, scent.


3. Juniper Ridge Cascade Forest Body Wash ($6 for two ounces)

(Sarah Jackson)

Pre-Shower Sniff Test: 8.5/10鈥斺淭hat is both musty and sour, about as stinky as I鈥檝e smelled you.鈥
Post-Shower Sniff Test: 0/10鈥斺赌淟辞惫别濒测!鈥
Hair: 4/5
Dishes: 1/5
Clothes: 4/5

Heavy notes of pine and rosemary, coupled with a lot of fancy oils that felt fantastic on my skin, made the best for showering. Out of all the soaps here, it鈥檚 the one I鈥檒l continue to use daily. Since it has 鈥渂ody wash鈥 in its name, I didn鈥檛 expect the Cascade Forest to do well cleaning dishes and the shirt, but I was pleasantly surprised when it left the shirt feeling fresh and odor-free. Though my skepticism was partially warranted: the Cascade Forest was by far the toughest to wash dishes with. I scrubbed the plate 65 times (oh yes, I counted) and was still left with a bit of grease and a slight peanut-butter smell. Mix that with the rosemary scent, and you鈥檝e got an off-putting combination. It鈥檚 sad to see such a powerful stink fighter in third place.


4. Alpine Provisions Fir and Sage Castile Soap ($4 for two ounces)

(Sarah Jackson)

Pre-Shower Sniff Test: 8/10鈥斺淲ow, that is bad. (Lets out a slight gag.) I would have to say you smell like a mixture of chemicals and a musty abandoned warehouse.鈥
Post-Shower Sniff Test: 0/10鈥斺淵our armpits actually smell quite nice now.鈥
Hair: 3.5/5
Dishes: 1.5/5
Clothes: 4/5

Once I run out of Juniper Ridge soap, I鈥檓 using this next. Its mixture of fir and sage lends a nice masculine smell and worked magic on both BO and funk caught in my clothes. The coconut and olive-oil base was soothing on my skin聽but unfortunately was outgunned by the oils in my hair and the grease on the dishes. Alpine Provisions only bills this for use while bathing or showering, but I wanted to put it through the same gauntlet of tests as the others in case the soap had the same powers against crusted food and grease.


5. Sea to Summit Wilderness Wash ($4 for 1.3 ounces)

(Sarah Jackson)

Pre-Shower Sniff Test: 6/10鈥斺淎 hippy who just put on a clean shirt.鈥
Post-Shower Sniff Test: 5/10鈥斺淚t took the edge off, but you still smell like a pizza shop.鈥
Hair: 2/5
Dishes: 3.5/5
Clothes: 4/5

If the camping tasks were all that mattered in this test, would have made the race for first a tight one. It proved an excellent dish and laundry soap for a camp environment but was the worst at cutting down on odors. This wash doesn鈥檛 have much of its own smell, which would have helped mask lingering stink. But I do have to say: it was nice to not have my dishes smelling like men鈥檚 cologne after I was done washing them.

Lead Photo: Sarah Jackson

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