Synthetic vs Natural Perfume Ingredients: Which Is Better for the Planet?
By Emmanuelle Moeglin, Founder & Perfumer
Many people assume natural means purer, safer and kinder. In the lab it is never that simple. Here is how naturals and synthetics really compare, for the planet and for your skin, and what is changing.
01
What is the difference between natural and synthetic perfume ingredients?
A natural ingredient is taken directly from a plant, or once from an animal, by distillation, cold pressing or solvent extraction. Rose oil, bergamot and vetiver are naturals. If you want to know how each method works, read our guide to how perfumery ingredients are extracted from plants.
A synthetic ingredient is a single molecule made by chemistry. Some are nature-identical: vanillin is the main scent molecule of vanilla, and linalool is found in lavender and coriander. Others do not exist in nature at all, like the clean white musks or the velvety woody molecules that shape modern perfumery. Their starting materials can come from petroleum, but also from renewable sources such as turpentine, a by-product of the paper industry, or plant sugars.
Most fine fragrances use both. Naturals bring depth and life; molecules bring radiance, lasting power and notes nature cannot give us.
02
What is the environmental cost of natural ingredients?
Naturals depend on land, water, weather and time. Yields can be tiny: it takes several tonnes of rose petals, picked by hand, to distil a single kilo of rose oil. A poor harvest or a drought changes both the price and the scent.
Several tonnes of hand-picked rose petals make a single kilo of oil.
The bigger problem is over-harvesting of slow-growing trees. Wild Indian sandalwood was cut so heavily over the last century that the species is now listed as vulnerable. Brazilian rosewood, once a staple for its soft floral linalool, was felled across the Amazon, and its international trade is now controlled. Oud comes from agarwood trees that produce their fragrant resin only when infected; wild trees were cut down in the search for it, and all agarwood species are now listed under international trade controls.
There is a human side too. Most of the world's natural vanilla comes from Madagascar, where every flower is pollinated by hand and growers often see little of the final value. Patchouli and sandalwood supply chains have faced similar questions about working conditions.
Naturals depend on land, water, weather and time.
03
How did synthetics replace animal ingredients?
Perfumery once relied on four animal materials. Musk came from a gland of the male musk deer, civet from the civet cat, castoreum from the beaver, and ambergris from the sperm whale, which forms it in its gut. Natural ambergris is found washed up on beaches, but its link to a protected species means its trade is banned in several countries.
Synthetics made all of these unnecessary. Chemists recreated the warmth of musk with muscone and a whole family of soft white musks, rebuilt civet and castoreum as accords, and created Ambroxan as an alternative to ambergris. Ambroxan was traditionally made from sclareol, a material from clary sage; today it can also be made by fermenting sugar cane. This is why most perfumes today contain no animal materials at all.
Many materials once taken from the wild now come from the lab.
04
Are synthetic perfume ingredients bad for the environment?
Some have been. The early nitro musks were cheap and powerful, but several were later banned in EU cosmetics, and musk xylene was phased out after it was found to be very persistent and to build up in living organisms. Perfumery replaced them with new generations of musks. Galaxolide, a polycyclic musk created in the 1960s, is still one of the most widely used musks in perfumery today, loved for its clean, soft, laundry-fresh warmth. Because it breaks down slowly, its environmental profile is closely watched, and the newest generation, the macrocyclic musks, are designed to biodegrade more readily.
The footprint of a synthetic also depends on its chemistry: where its starting material comes from, how many steps it takes to make, and how much energy and solvent that uses. A molecule made in a few clean steps from a renewable source is a very different proposition from one built from petrochemicals through a long, wasteful process. So "synthetic" is no more a guarantee of sustainability than "natural" is.
05
Are natural ingredients safer for your skin?
Not necessarily. Allergens occur in both. Essential oils are rich in molecules such as linalool, limonene, citral, geraniol and eugenol, all known skin sensitisers at high enough levels. Your skin reacts to the molecule, not to where it came from: linalool from lavender oil behaves just like linalool made in a lab. Some synthetics are sensitisers too.
Regulation treats them the same way. Industry standards set safe limits for naturals and synthetics alike, and in 2023 the EU expanded the list of fragrance allergens that must be named on cosmetic labels from 26 to more than 80. Some molecules have been withdrawn completely: Lilial, a classic lily-of-the-valley note, has been banned in EU and UK cosmetics since 2022.
Weighing naturals and synthetics by hand in the lab.
06
What is changing in sustainable perfumery?
The most interesting developments are blurring the line between natural and synthetic.
1
Upcycled naturals.
Suppliers now recover scent from the by-products of other industries: food processing waste, fruit juice residues, timber offcuts. A waste stream becomes a perfumery material, with no extra land needed.
2
Cleaner extraction.
CO2 extraction uses no petrochemical solvent and gentle temperatures, and gives extracts that smell close to the living plant. Some absolutes are now made with bio-based solvents instead of hexane.
3
Fermentation.
Biotechnology can produce key molecules by fermenting plant sugars, much as beer is brewed. Ambroxan from sugar cane is the best-known example, and the same route is opening up for woody and ambery notes that once depended on scarce trees.
4
Biodegradable molecules.
New molecules are increasingly designed to break down readily in the environment, a direct response to the persistence of older musks.
5
Better-grown naturals.
Plantation sandalwood and cultivated agarwood now take pressure off wild trees, and traceable supply chains make it easier to know where a material comes from.
In our own Sandalwood Musk, Indian sandalwood is paired with mineral Ambroxan, the molecule first created as an alternative to ambergris.
A single natural ingredient, rose absolute for instance, contains over three hundred molecules working together. That molecular richness is what gives it depth, movement and the sense that you are smelling a living material rather than a flat impression of one. But that same complexity can make a fragrance heavy, dense and difficult to wear on its own. Synthetic molecules are the opposite: each one is a precise, single note, clean and controlled, but used alone the result can feel too linear, too legible. Modern perfumery lives in the tension between the two. A natural brings texture, warmth and an almost painterly layering of facets; a synthetic sharpens the outline, lifts the projection and holds the structure in place for hours. That balance is what makes a well-built fragrance feel effortless to wear yet impossible to fully decode, and it is why, in the lab, the question is never one or the other. It is always both.
Smell and learn
07
Natural vs synthetic at a glance
Ingredient
The natural and its cost
The alternative
Musk
Musk deer gland; no longer used
Muscone and soft white musks
Ambergris
Sperm whale; rare, trade restricted
Ambroxan, from clary sage or fermented sugar cane
Civet and castoreum
Civet cat and beaver; no longer used
Accords built from molecules
Sandalwood
Slow-growing trees; wild Indian sandalwood is vulnerable
Plantation sandalwood and sandalwood molecules
Rosewood
Amazonian tree; trade now controlled
Linalool, from other plants or synthesis
Oud
Wild agarwood; trade now controlled
Cultivated agarwood and oud accords
Vanilla
Hand-pollinated orchid, mostly from Madagascar
Vanillin
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Frequently asked questions about natural and synthetic perfume ingredients
Are synthetic perfume ingredients better for the planet than natural ones?
Not automatically. Some synthetics save land, water and endangered species, while some older ones persist in the environment. It depends on each material and how it is made or grown.
Are natural perfumes safer for your skin?
No. Essential oils contain common allergens such as linalool, limonene and citral, and the same safety limits apply to naturals and synthetics alike.
Do perfumes still contain animal ingredients?
Very rarely. Musk, civet, castoreum and ambergris have been replaced by synthetic molecules and accords, so most perfumes today contain no animal materials.
Why is natural sandalwood so rare?
Wild Indian sandalwood was over-harvested for a century and is now listed as vulnerable. Much of the sandalwood used today comes from plantations, or is replaced by sandalwood molecules.
What is Ambroxan made from?
It was traditionally made from sclareol, from clary sage, as an alternative to ambergris. It can now also be made by fermenting sugar cane.
Are synthetic musks bad for the environment?
Some older ones were. Several nitro musks are banned in EU cosmetics, and polycyclic musks break down slowly. Newer musks are increasingly designed to biodegrade.
Emmanuelle Moeglin is the founder and perfumer of Experimental Perfume Club. Classically trained at ISIPCA, with 20 years in the fragrance industry, she is a member of the French Society of Perfumers, a multi-award-winning creator and a public speaker, and teaches perfumery from our central London lab.
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