- Home
- Ingredients
- Preservative
Preservative
Every ingredient in the dictionary that works as a preservative — what it is, where it came from, and how long it has been doing the job.
40 ingredients in the dictionary
Browse by what it does

Methylparaben
METHYLPARABEN
The shortest-chain member of the paraben family, in use as a cosmetic and pharmaceutical preservative since the 1920s and still permitted in the European Union at up to 0.4 per cent.

Phenoxyethanol
PHENOXYETHANOL
A synthetic aromatic alcohol that has become the default broad-spectrum preservative in cosmetics, permitted in the European Union at a maximum of one per cent.