Baking soda for acne: does it help or irritate?

No trial has tested baking soda on acne, so no source shows that it helps. The American Academy of Dermatology (AAD) names baking soda once in connection with acne, as an ingredient of toothpaste, and its verdict is short: "None of these ingredients fight acne, but they can irritate or harm your skin." This page is part of Skinli's guide to home remedies for acne.

Skinli gives general education and is not a doctor. For the studies below, Skinli read the published summaries (abstracts). No source read for this guide gives a way to use baking soda on acne, so this page gives no recipe.

No study has tested baking soda on acne

The searches run for this guide found no study of baking soda on acne in people. Baking soda is the kitchen name for sodium bicarbonate. The NHS acne page and the NICE acne guideline for England do not mention it.

The AAD sentence about it is on a page about adult acne, in an answer about toothpaste: "Toothpaste often contains abrasive ingredients like calcium or baking soda, whitening agents like peroxide, color, and flavor." Abrasive means rough enough to scrape a surface. That is the only place where an AAD page read for this guide names baking soda together with acne. Skinli's guide to toothpaste on a pimple covers the rest of that answer.

What the baking soda box says about skin

The brand of baking soda read for this guide carries a "Drug Facts" label, because the box is also sold as a medicine. Skinli read that label on DailyMed, the label database of the US National Library of Medicine. The FDA explains the "Uses" line of such a label as: "Symptoms or diseases the product will treat or prevent."

Label line	What the box says
Active ingredient	"Sodium Bicarbonate 100%"
Purpose on skin	"Skin Protectant"
Skin uses	"temporarily protects and helps relieve minor skin irritation and itching due to:" "poison ivy, oak, sumac" and "insect bites"
Warnings	"do not get in eyes" and "in some cases, soaking too long may overdry skin"
Stop and ask a doctor if	"condition worsens", or "symptoms last more than 7 days or clear up and occur again within a few days"
Second purpose	"Antacid", for heartburn, taken by mouth

The label gives directions for a paste, a bath soak and a wet cloth, all for the itch uses in the table. Acne and pimples appear nowhere on it. The wording comes from an FDA rule for skin protectant drugs, which lists "(o) Sodium bicarbonate." among its ingredients. A label is written by the company that sells the product.

Baking soda works against acid, and healthy skin is acid

MedlinePlus, the health site of the US National Library of Medicine, describes the medicine this way: "Sodium bicarbonate is an antacid used to relieve heartburn and acid indigestion." An antacid is a medicine that works against acid. The page adds: "Your doctor also may prescribe sodium bicarbonate to make your blood or urine less acidic in certain conditions."

The surface of healthy skin is acid. pH is the scale used to measure acid, and a lower number means more acid. A 2006 paper reports measurements on 330 people and says: "it is estimated that the 'natural' skin surface pH is on average 4.7, i.e. below 5." The paper makes three points that matter here:

• "skin with pH values below 5.0 is in a better condition than skin with pH values above 5.0"
• "an acid skin pH (4-4.5) keeps the resident bacterial flora attached to the skin, whereas an alkaline pH (8-9) promotes the dispersal from the skin." Alkaline is the opposite of acid. The resident flora are the bacteria that normally live on skin.
• "the use of plain tap water, in Europe with a pH value generally around 8.0, will increase skin pH up to 6 h after application"

The measurements were made on the inner forearm, and the first author worked at a maker of soap and body care products.

A 2018 review on pH and acne, written by one author, says: "Increase of skin surface pH leads to impaired barrier function, disturbances in skin microbiome and inflammation." The barrier is the outer layer of the skin, and the microbiome is the mix of microbes that live on it. The review presents a link between skin pH and acne as a possibility.

No source read for this guide gives the pH of baking soda or of a baking soda paste, so this page prints no figure for it. No study measured what a paste does to the acidity of a face with acne. What NICE advises for washing is clear: people with acne should use a "non-alkaline" cleanser.

A related trial in people: soap compared with an acidic cleanser

One trial shows what a wash that is less acid than skin can do to acne. It tested soap, and baking soda was not part of it.

In 1995, researchers in Munich gave 120 teenagers and young adults with inflamed acne either an ordinary soap or an acidic cleansing bar to use on the face each morning and evening for 3 months. The acidic bar was a syndet, short for synthetic detergent. The results were counted in 57 people per group.

Measure	Soap	Acidic cleansing bar
Inflamed pimples, average count at the start	14.6	13.4
Inflamed pimples, average count later in the trial	15.3	10.4
People with signs of irritation	40.4 percent	1.8 percent

The authors concluded that the pimple count "is clearly lower when a syndet bar of the acidic type is regularly used for cleansing the face as compared to a (necessarily alkaline) soap."

The trial was open, which means people knew which bar they had. A 2018 review of cleansers describes the two types: "Cleansers are composed of alkaline soaps or the less barrier-damaging synthetic detergents, known as syndets." The guide on how to choose a cleanser for acne-prone skin covers what to look for.

A paste rubbed on the face is a scrub

Baking soda is a powder, and the AAD calls it abrasive. Rubbing a paste of it on the face is a scrub. The AAD's guide to exfoliating, which means removing dead skin, explains: "Mechanical exfoliation uses a tool, such as a brush, pad, or sponge, or a scrub to physically remove dead skin cells." Chemical exfoliation dissolves dead skin with acids.

The same guide says: "Those with dry, sensitive or acne-prone skin may prefer just a washcloth and a mild chemical exfoliator, as mechanical exfoliation may be too irritating for this skin type." For people who already use acne medicine, it adds: "Exfoliating while using these products may worsen dry skin or even cause acne breakouts."

Other pages agree. The AAD says: "Scrubbing can irritate your skin, causing acne to flare." The NHS says: "do not scrub your skin as this can irritate it and make acne worse".

Drying is the second problem. The box itself warns about overdrying. The AAD tells people with acne: "Skin with acne is oily, so it can be tempting to apply astringent and acne treatments until your face feels dry. Don't. Dry skin is irritated skin." It explains what follows: "When your skin becomes dry, your body makes more oil. The extra oil can clog your pores, which may lead to more breakouts."

Scrubbing can also leave dark marks. The AAD's exfoliating guide says to "avoid strong chemical or mechanical exfoliation if you have a darker skin tone or notice dark spots on your skin after burns, bug bites or acne breakouts". The guide to over-exfoliated skin lists the signs of too much scrubbing.

Baking soda in finished products, and questions no source answers

Baking soda is an ingredient in some bath, skin and hair products. A 2025 report by the Cosmetic Ingredient Review, a panel that the FDA describes as the cosmetics industry's own body for reviewing ingredient safety, concluded that it and two related ingredients "are safe as cosmetic ingredients in the practices of use and concentrations as described in the safety assessment." That finding is limited to baking soda as one ingredient of a finished product, at the amounts makers use. A home paste left on the face is outside it.

Three questions stay open:

• Baking soda left on overnight. No study tested it for any length of time.
• Baking soda mixed with lemon juice or coconut oil. No study of either mix on acne was found. The pages on lemon juice for acne and coconut oil for acne report what exists on each.
• Whether drying a pimple helps it. No study tested this. The AAD's advice above is to keep skin with acne from drying out.

What the AAD, the NHS and the FDA rule support

The AAD's answer about toothpaste ends with what to use: "rely on clinically proven acne-fighting ingredients like adapalene, benzoyl peroxide, and salicylic acid to treat your adult acne." The NHS acne page says to "try acne treatments you put on your skin such as salicylic acid or benzoyl peroxide". The FDA rule for acne drugs sold without a prescription lists benzoyl peroxide at 2.5 to 10 percent, salicylic acid at 0.5 to 2 percent, sulfur at 3 to 10 percent, and sulfur combined with resorcinol. Sodium bicarbonate is absent from that list.

Adapalene is a retinoid, a medicine related to vitamin A, and the AAD says acne treatment that contains it is sold online and in stores. The AAD's acne pages name a maker of prescription acne drugs as their supporter. Skinli's guide to salicylic acid and benzoyl peroxide compares the two ingredients that the NHS names.

When to stop, and when to see a doctor

Wash baking soda off if the skin stings, burns or itches. The AAD's advice for face masks is: "Immediately wash off a facial mask if you feel itching, burning, or stinging. This could be a sign of skin irritation or an allergy."

For the acne itself, the NHS says to see a GP, which is a family doctor, if "you've tried treating it yourself but it's not getting better", or if "you have lots of spots, or the spots are deep, painful or causing scars". The AAD says to see a dermatologist when acne causes cysts and nodules, which are deep blemishes that can leave scars, or when acne has not cleared with treatment you can buy without a prescription.